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46 DECEMBER 2016 | FUEL OIL NEWS | www.fueloilnews.com the system blower, Figure 4. Both check out okay and operate just fine. The case ties into the case shown in Figure 2 and the 24 Vac gas valve again checks out okay and will operate alone, but not with the IFC control. The 120 Vac hot surface igniter (HSI), in this case a Honeywell "Glowfly," also checks out okay with my meter and when powered. I now start reconnecting things one at a time and do not get the LED to show me a problem until the HSI is con- nected. Knowing that these things really like their grounding, we start to check that all over again and that's when the problem shows itself. It's not a poor ground, it's a missing ground! The problem is not in my wiring in the cases themselves, it's in my house wiring, gotcha! It turns out that the wall outlet in my garage, which in the summer I use as a second shop, was not grounded. Assume nothing Georgie, assume nothing! I could blame this on the original electrician, but if you're using a power supply you should always check it. So it's my fault. Here's how you can check for a faulty ground. Identify the wires in question first. According to the National Electrical Code (NFPA70) only two wires must be color-coded. Green must always signify ground and white must always signify neu- tral. In many cases the ground may not be an insulated wire and be carried through the conduit or be protected by the cable outer sheathing. The hot lead can be any color but in this case we'll make it black, Figure 5. Most systems today are polarized, meaning white is neutral, black is hot. Set your meter for measuring AC Volts, (Vac). Place the black lead of your multimeter onto the neutral and the red lead onto the hot. The display should show a value of 109 to 132 volts, the standard range for North America. If the display puts a minus sign in front of the number, the polarity in your circuit is reversed. That's not an issue with simple electrical equipment like motors and lights, but it can cause problems for sophisticated electronics like the control in question. Next, remove the black probe from the neutral and move it to the ground wire. The voltage should be the same. Finally, insert your black probe onto the neu- tral and the red probe onto the ground. The voltage should read zero. If you get a voltage on this final test, the circuit is improperly grounded and will not work with an electronic control of the type we are using until it has been rewired. I've since done the box over since I do plug lots of things in there, including my snow blower starter and although it has never been a problem in eight years a micro- processor-based control didn't like that missing ground wire, no Siree! In Figure 6 we have two more of our new training units. These are mounted on one of our training carts where we have students wire up a burner system and fire it off. We are building more of these training carts and cases ourselves s i n c e w h e n y o u a r e teaching servicemen we all relate to touchy-feely better than lectures. Honeywell originated t h e " s u i t c a s e " c o n - cept and we just keep copying it and improving on it. We keep building trainers because we find that guys really get into the hands-on much more than the lecture, and so that just makes a lot of sense. See ya! l F O N George Lanthier is the owner of Firedragon Academy, a 25-year-old Massachusetts Certified School teaching both gas and oil and other heating subjects. Firedragon Academy has its hands-on training facil- ity in Sturbridge, Massachusetts at the Beckett Training Center. Firedragon is also a publishing firm publishing George's over 60 books and manuals on HVAC subjects. He is a CETP, NATE, NORA, PMAA and PMEF Proctor and has been a Massachusetts Certified Instructor since 1975. He can be reached at 608 Moose Hill Road, Leicester, MA 01524. His phone is 508-421-3490 and his website can be found at FiredragonEnt.com Figure 6 Figure 4 Figure 5