Having one of those issues that google indicates anything from "no big deal" to "turn off the power immediately" depending on the forum post. Curious to get the Texags wisdom with my specific information.

2024 construction, house is new to us. The issue that tipped off the troubleshooting is that lights flicker with the Washer agitating motor changing directions. Common issue but no consensus online.

Tested every plug. Tested the flickering light sockets. ~122 hot to neutral. Basically 0(cheap multimeter sometimes shows <1volt) voltage from neutral to ground.

L1-N and L2-N are ~1 volt delta just before the main breaker under load. No delta with no load. Seems within tolerance?

Washer makes the lights flicker when plugged into other circuits / on the other hot leg. Washer is normally on its own circuit.

Panel has temperature variation but no "hot spots". Looks fine to me through a FLIR and everything is roughly ambient temp. All panel connections are tight.

The worst offenders are all Bulbrite dimmable edisons. Some LED can lights also flicker with much less frequency. Some bulbs on the same circuits never flicker.

I was thinking loose neutral but can't find one and no other issues. I am now thinking the washer motor pulls a huge but normal load and these are just cheap LEDs that can't handle the brief inrush.

Anything else you guys would check? I will definitely replace the bulbs but didn't want to mask a small wiring issue if I can fix it first.

F-in LED. I've been on a crusade to stockpile as many halogen and incandescent bulbs as I can for **** like this. Still got a couple of led in the house but they are in the trash when they die.

dudeabides said:

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You didn't mention what make and model of washer you have, but it is possible that it has frequency drive to control the agitator. These frequency drives take in the regular 60hz sine wave and modulate it to an extremely high frequency in order to control motor speed and torque more precisely. The down side is that they often put unwanted harmonics or noise back out into the electrical system. Maybe that is what is happening here?

LED light drivers can be pretty sensitive to this noise, as can other electronics. Changing LEDs might help…. Another solution would be use a power conditioner with the washer to limit the unwanted harmonics/noise back into your electrical service.

Here's one that should help, assuming the above theory is correct: Furman AC-215A Compact Power Conditioner

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agreed with this post.

go buy some Philips Ultra Definition light bulbs and 99% chance that you're good to go.

I see this complaint pretty regularly on new house inspections and one year warranty inspections.

I have come to believe the primary culprit is the cheapo led fixtures and bulbs. I hate the new one piece "can" lights the builders are using everywhere. They seem incredibly problematic.

So, I would be in the it not a big deal camp.

As others mention "some" of the LED lighting products out there are a lot more sensitive to electrical noise of multiple types and particularly certain harmonic distortion frequencies produced by the smaller, cheaper drives commonly found in energy efficient washers.

There are companies that now sell "washing machine" line side reactors/chokes that you can have installed to signficantly dampen the harmonics the washer drive sends upstream to other circuits. This same solution has been used for several decades in large industrial and commercial operations where harmonics from drives or lots of electronic switching power supplies were causing problems for other electronic equipment in the facility. The problem started appearing in the residential market as the energy efficiency washers hit the market. While the reactors/chokes don't completely filter out all the harmonics they generally dampen them enough to be non-problematic if they are sized correctly. In many instances they are a much lower cost solution than a full blown power conditioner or harmonic filtering system.