Charging issues at home after a storm

[A-Wimoweh]

This past Thursday night, a big storm rolled thru my area. Lots of rain and lighting. I came home during the middle of the storm. I waited till the storm had passed to plugin my car and charge.
After we arrived home and it was still storming, we noticed the lights flickering, like they might do during a storm. Almost like a warning that the power might be on its way out. Well, the storm passed, and our lights are still flickering 3 days later. Not constantly, maybe every few minutes or so. Seems random, not related to the AC or fridge, or anything like that. This is a new house, 1 year old, and never experienced anything like this.
So charging the Tesla with the wall charger is also impacted too. It will charge up about 7%, then say charging interrupted. Never did that before. If I unplug, plug it back in, and start charging again I will get about another 7%. Does not matter if I drop the amps down to something low, like 15, instead of the normal 48.
I had the power company out over the weekend and they checked the meter, and the line to the house. Said I have perfect voltage. Its gotta be something on the inside. I told them I have a surge breaker in my box, and they said that is likely the cause. But the green status light on the surge breaker shows its okay.
A few neighbors on nextdoor are also reporting the issue. We did seem to loose our Keurig during this storm too.
What could be causing this, where should I start looking?

 

[whitex]

Which jungle do you live in (your location says "jungle").

 

[tfinan]

Have power company look for shorts in the service drop due to missing insulation from tree branch friction. Our lights only flickered when the wind blew the trees.

 

[ewoodrick]

This past Thursday night, a big storm rolled thru my area. Lots of rain and lighting. I came home during the middle of the storm. I waited till the storm had passed to plugin my car and charge.
After we arrived home and it was still storming, we noticed the lights flickering, like they might do during a storm. Almost like a warning that the power might be on its way out. Well, the storm passed, and our lights are still flickering 3 days later. Not constantly, maybe every few minutes or so. Seems random, not related to the AC or fridge, or anything like that. This is a new house, 1 year old, and never experienced anything like this.
So charging the Tesla with the wall charger is also impacted too. It will charge up about 7%, then say charging interrupted. Never did that before. If I unplug, plug it back in, and start charging again I will get about another 7%. Does not matter if I drop the amps down to something low, like 15, instead of the normal 48.
I had the power company out over the weekend and they checked the meter, and the line to the house. Said I have perfect voltage. Its gotta be something on the inside. I told them I have a surge breaker in my box, and they said that is likely the cause. But the green status light on the surge breaker shows its okay.
A few neighbors on nextdoor are also reporting the issue. We did seem to loose our Keurig during this storm too.
What could be causing this, where should I start looking?

Try going to 120V and see what happens.

 

[erik_k]

Try going to 120V and see what happens.

That’s a pretty good suggestion. Also try both 120v legs off different phase. Might just be one side/leg that’s affected.

 

[A-Wimoweh]

Which jungle do you live in (your location says "jungle").

East Coast, near DC.

I doubt its wind related. But here is some more info. I have alot of smart dimmer switches in my house. Like 90% of them. Only the smart dimmer switches are having this problem, and only when they are on at less than 100%. What happens is if they are on and dimmed, they will all flash at the exact same time to 100% brightness just for an instant, like a camera flash. Lights that are on and on a regular dumb switch do not do this.

 

[A-Wimoweh]

That’s a pretty good suggestion. Also try both 120v legs off different phase. Might just be one side/leg that’s affected.

I have no idea how to do this. I could pull the mobile connector out and plug it into an electrical outlet, that's about it.

 

[erik_k]

That’s a start. That’ll test one 120v leg/phase off your panel. See what the results of that test are. Either good or not it’s all more data to help narrow down your symptoms.

 

[Nda721]

Interesting...
not experiencing anything similar here... I would go with something wrong with one of your phases...
I would actually recommend restarting your software (assuming you didn't do that already)...
charging door wouldn't open yesterday... but a simple restart fixed it.

 

[Dithermaster]

I don't know what's wrong with your power, but I know a little about how dimmers work, and perhaps that will help you or someone learn more about what's wrong with your power. Electronic household dimming uses "phase angle" dimming. An SCR is off for some part of the AC half-cycle, and triggers part way through, conducting until the next zero-crossing. The later the trigger the dimmer the lamp. Noise on the power can confuse them and they trigger at the wrong time, causing the lamp to be dimmer or brighter. Good luck with your power issue! I hope your utility can connect some monitoring equipment and figure it out.

 

[whitex]

East Coast, near DC.

I doubt its wind related. But here is some more info. I have alot of smart dimmer switches in my house. Like 90% of them. Only the smart dimmer switches are having this problem, and only when they are on at less than 100%. What happens is if they are on and dimmed, they will all flash at the exact same time to 100% brightness just for an instant, like a camera flash. Lights that are on and on a regular dumb switch do not do this.

Obviously something is going on with your power. I'd suggest having someone look at this. If this reproduces every few minutes, someone with an oscilloscope or similar logging device should be able to capture the power irregularities and go from there. Since you said it happens to neighbors too, it's likely a problem outside of your house which the power company will have to fix, you just might have to give them more information to show there is problem.

 

[RDuke]

I'd call the power company and ask them to install a logging monitor (on a temporary basis) to see if you're getting clean power 100% of the time. I had a situation that turned out to be a corroded neutral wire on the feed line from the street transformer into my house. It was really intermittent. Power company put s recording monitor at my meter for a week and they were able to detect the issue that way.