Outlets testing at 180 hz

Sam151

I had just changed an outlet and I noticed that the new outlet and several others nearby were testing at 179.9hz I know 60hz is common, but I haven't been able to find an answer as to why some are testing higher, or if this is something I should be concerned about.

Any answers would be greatly appreciated.

Lavid2002

What's the voltage on said outlets?

joecaption

Why would you even be checking for HZ?
Instead of just polarity and voltage?

Sam151

Voltage is at 120.

I wasn't deliberately testing for hz, but did notice it and thought it strange. Any concerns?

ddawg16

What are you using to measure the frequency?

Any chance you have a bunch of CFL's on that ckt? If so, the harmonics on from them could be making your cheap freq counter give you that freq. 180 Hz is 3x the natural freq of 60 Hz...

You would really need to look at it with an osciloscope to know for sure what is going on.

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mpoulton

There's something wrong with the meter. It's measuring the third harmonic for some reason. There may be nonlinear electronic loads on that circuit (like the CFL's mentioned) that are adding a third-harmonic component, but the meter should still read the main 60Hz waveform, not the minor harmonic component.

Auger01

Like the other have said, you have a meter problem. Fluke is pretty much the gold standard in meters and I hear that Milwaukee is now making a good meter. You might try one of those.