Electric Question

[riptides]

So I wake up yesterday and parts of my house are without power. I look for a circuit breaker that tripped and found none. I flipped them anyway and still no power. Although when I flipped a suspect breaker back on, for a second I get a light in one room on the first floor. Then nothing, and the circuit breaker is not tripped.

So I start looking for any GFI's inline. Well, really cannot find any on that circuit. I think. I really don't know what the run looks like. So outside I go, on the second floor I find some GFI's tripped and cannot reset them. What the hey?

So now I am thinking I got two lines with issues. Or one big mess of a circuit. Since GFI's usually, my understanding go downstream, I am hoping the circuit breaker or breakers may be faulty.

What say you, what do you all think.

And I am calling in an electrician because I just don't mess with power. But I would like to understand it more.

 

[20 20]

Glad to hear your getting an electrician, electricity can be a real head ache and could easily cause death. I would suggest watching asking following{without getting in the way} your electrician around. When the electrician finds the problem he/she should fill you in on what happened.

 

[Mark_in_NH]

This may not even be close to the cause of your situation but several times over the years my Father would get calls for something similar. On some of those occasions we would find that there was a loose connections outside, where your service entrance wire that goes up the side of your house, connects to the power line coming in from the street. If this is the cause of your problem and this is a BIG if. One side of your panel is dead or getting an intermitant feed. As wind moves the overhead wires the connection opens / closes. It may sound a little farfetched but it does happen.
Have the electriction check check both legs of your service entrance for power. This is one of those process of elimination jobs. If everything checks out at the panel and out to the street, then you start looking the other direction.
The reason you can't reset theose GFI outlets you mentioned is because the outlet is currently dead as in no power. Good luck and let us know what you discover.

 

[Bird]

I have never had to replace a GFI breaker, but many years ago, our house had a GFI breaker in the master panel in the garage and it would kick off any time I tried to use my electric razor in the bathroom. I finally decided I'd buy a new breaker, but when I went to get it, I was fortunate enough to find a knowledgeable salesman who asked questions, told me it was very unusual for one to go bad, what I should check first, etc. That breaker controlled the outlets in 2 bathrooms and an outdoor outlet by the front door and one by the back door. I simply removed the covers from those outlets, blew the cobwebs out with my air compressor, and put the covers back on. Problem solved.

 

[Egon]

What say you, what do you all think.

Calling the Electrician is a wise move. They have instuments for tracing circuits that makes life much easier.

Last year I smelled something like burned electrical insulation. Found a very hot fuse box that was probably installed in 1934 when the house was built. [When we bought the house I though it was inoperational.] Traced down the circuit and breaker in the modern but mainly unlabeled main box. The electrician came and installed a new connection box to replace the fuses and then installed a GFI box inline just down stream from the main box. No room in the main box for the GFI. All is happy since.

 

[riptides]

Last year I smelled something like burned electrical insulation. Found a very hot fuse box that was probably installed in 1934 when the house was built. [When we bought the house I though it was inoperational.] Traced down the circuit and breaker in the modern but mainly unlabeled main box. The electrician came and installed a new connection box to replace the fuses and then installed a GFI box inline just down stream from the main box. No room in the main box for the GFI. All is happy since.

I have been there. Since this place is a demolition/remodel I opted to replace all electric and plumbing. Parts of the place are over 100 years old. I was amazed and dismayed that people would actually do some of the things we found when inspecting the electric runs. I was actually surprized to find a basic extension cord running under tacked carpet into a wall outlet that then fed another wall outlet.

I am hoping with the extreme cold, that something just stretched, or I am thinking that maybe one of my flood light banks has a short. The floods have been burning bulbs at a strange rate.

We shall see. I am just disappointed, since the electric is really only two years "new".

 

[kenstrac]

If you are burning bulbs at a strange rate you might have lost a neutral causing high voltage to the bulbs do you have a volt meter?

 

[JB4310]

I had a similar problem in my detached shop that is powered by it's own D/B underground service, Mine turned out to be low voltage on one of the hot legs.

A 2 inch section of the large 4-O wire oxidized to the point of just one 14GA strand left. apparently there was a nick in the insulation that let water in.
The cable was all swollen up and powderized.

.

 

[Western]

I have never had to replace a GFI breaker, but many years ago, our house had a GFI breaker in the master panel in the garage and it would kick off any time I tried to use my electric razor in the bathroom. I finally decided I'd buy a new breaker, but when I went to get it, I was fortunate enough to find a knowledgeable salesman who asked questions, told me it was very unusual for one to go bad, what I should check first, etc. That breaker controlled the outlets in 2 bathrooms and an outdoor outlet by the front door and one by the back door. I simply removed the covers from those outlets, blew the cobwebs out with my air compressor, and put the covers back on. Problem solved.

Bird, That's some shaver! sure you're not shaving with an electric weed eater...

I have had problems with fire ants getting into panels ,sub panels, ac units. It's the first thing I look for if it isn't an obvious problem now. My cousin has been a HVAC guy all his life, said he gets this problem allot since the fire ants have moved in. He swears they are some how attracted to the power?? Don't know if that's true but, I have had short out and found "fried" ants...

 

[beenthere]

Sounds like you have a GFI that is working correctly, and there is a "fault" leaking off power to a ground somewhere. They trip off when there is any imbalance between the hot line and the neutral line.
Un-plug everything down-line and see if the GFI's can be reset.

 

[JB4310]

You can't reset GFI's if there is no power to them. or the fault is continuous.
Just a shot in the dark, no pun, but maybe a loose connection at the main lugs or a breaker, Probably not very likely but something that would be checked if nothing else obvious.

JB.

 

[The Dougster]

In another house a few years ago we had the same problem... needing a shower, I brought a lamp in until I could get the problem resolved. When I plugged the lamp into an outlet, the lights came on, unplug and the lights went out... Now, I'm not very smart but I knew that something wasn't right.... removed the outlet only to discover that rather than wrap the wire around the set screw, the builders electrician had simply back-plugged the wire... I wired the outlet like it should have been done in the first place and solved the problem... same house many years later, this happened again. I went to the first outlet in that circuit and began checking... the 3rd one I checked was the guilty one... I am told that electricians are no longer allowed to do this, which would be a good thing.

 

[timswi]

In another house a few years ago we had the same problem... needing a shower, I brought a lamp in until I could get the problem resolved. When I plugged the lamp into an outlet, the lights came on, unplug and the lights went out... Now, I'm not very smart but I knew that something wasn't right.... removed the outlet only to discover that rather than wrap the wire around the set screw, the builders electrician had simply back-plugged the wire... I wired the outlet like it should have been done in the first place and solved the problem... same house many years later, this happened again. I went to the first outlet in that circuit and began checking... the 3rd one I checked was the guilty one... I am told that electricians are no longer allowed to do this, which would be a good thing.

Had the same problem when half of the main breaker went bad and cut the power supply in half.

 

[studor]

I am thinking Mark in NH has it. The feeds into the panel from outside usually have a fusible link at the top of the pole. If one side is bad, basically half of the 110 volt circuits will not work while the other half will -- No 220 volt appliance will work the way it is supposed to. Easy enough to check -- the panel will not have 220 anywhere. Not sure if your electrician can fix it -- in some cases the local power folks are required because it is before the meter. Frequently wind will cause the connection to make or break -- best to get it fixed however

 

[Patriotic Stabilist]

We had the fire ant problem at a rental. They kept getting into the AC unit. It was old anyway so we had it replaced finally and had the ground treated when we had the place termited so haven't had anymore issues. But they sure will get into electrical.

 

[DennisArrow]

Had a problem with a gfi motion sensor floodlight on the outside of my barn the other day. It would not reset........Ok, went and got a new gfi plug, installed it and the same thing.....Had to be something up in the light itself or the box it is installed in. Took it off. Each flood, 2, has 2 lets say 20ga wires coming out of it. From one of the lights both wires were pushed hard against the bare wire ground for the circuit and had crimped the insulation. Just crimped it, not broken insulation..........Pushed the bare ground back deep into the box and reinstalled the light.....all worked as it was supposed to. This light had been installed for perhaps 3 years and I suppose over time the pressure on the insulation finally got it thin enough for electron flow to take place.........Weird.......Dennis

 

[bp fick]

This past summer, had half the house go out. Yup, one leg of the underground supply was out. Thus, only had 1/2 the service panel powered. Simple fix. Power Company came out, foreman had his detector, found the spot immediately. (under my row of green beans!!)

They dug down 2.5 feet and spliced the line, hot gun new shrink wrap. All was well.

It doesn't take much a nick in the underground jacket to cause the ground acids (or whatever) to short out that line. It was aluminum, if memory serves.

 

[riptides]

My electrician has not shown up yet. The guy who wired the house.

 

[JB4310]

This is what my underground wire looked like in the part they cut out, was only about 3 inches like this, what I'm surprised about is I was using my 220 volt welder right up till it went out on that one leg, actually was still getting low voltage of around 30 volts.

Can't figure how the welder was running normally on that little strand that was left.

JB.

 

[riptides]

Update:

Two dead runs, got one half-way up. Cut the circuit in half to get some lights on and the GFI's back.

The problem with that run is still unknown, but I only have a few more outlets to check. Not sure if it goes into the other dead run.

The other dead run, have not gotten to yet.

May need a new wire, was the last thing heard. Resuming activity in a day or so.