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Message |
    
Ken Zeidner
Citizen
Username: Blackflag
Post Number: 10
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 10:09 am: |     |
Did anyone in the Warren Ave./Parker Ave. area of Maplewood experience a power surge this morning around 7:45? Our whole second floor lost electricity, and the circuit breaker would not return to the on position. Apparently it is OK now. |
tourne
Citizen
Username: Tourne
Post Number: 218
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 3:50 pm: | |
I would have an electrician check your wiring ASAP as something may be wrong with it. What your describing does not sound like it has anything to do with a "power surge." It sounds more like a short somewhere in your system. |
jgberkeley
Supporter
Username: Jgberkeley
Post Number: 3284
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 4:01 pm: | |
Point of fact.
Given that your circuit breaker is now in the On position and working, you do not have a short. If you still had one, the breaker would not stay open.
You could have had a short, but you would have seen sparks flying. You could have just overloaded the circuit and tripped the breaker on overload. If that was the case, the breaker internal part would heat up and trip and will not reset, until after the internal parts cooled back down.
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tourne
Citizen
Username: Tourne
Post Number: 220
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 9:23 pm: | |
Ok jg,
What caused the intermittent short? Was the circuit overloaded(ie. a whole lot of things were turned on at the same time)? Was something turned off before the breaker could be reset? Too many unanswered questions for my taste, when dealing with something that could burn your house down.
Ken, I would also look into installing the new Arc Fault (AFCI) circuit breakers in your sleeping/living space circuits, starting with the one that tripped. |
wharfrat
Citizen
Username: Wharfrat
Post Number: 834
Registered: 6-2001
| | Posted on Friday, November 7, 2003 - 6:12 am: | |
JG and Ken
FWIW, the circuit breaker, it may have overheated and would not reset until it cooled. This happened to me and I replaced the little bugger.
Tourne-
AFCI's work on dedicated room circuits, meaning the power, return and ground (3 wires) go only to the bedroom.
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Ken Zeidner
Citizen
Username: Blackflag
Post Number: 11
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Friday, November 7, 2003 - 10:18 am: | |
Thanks for all the suggestions-we have an electrician coming to look at the box. |
tourne
Citizen
Username: Tourne
Post Number: 221
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, November 7, 2003 - 12:30 pm: | |
wharfrat,
AFCI's should work as a replacement for any regular circuit breaker with the same amperage rating, though the new Code would require them only on bedroom circuits. Otherwise, I am not sure what you mean. A little extra protection only sets the pocket book back about $35-$45(price of an AFCI). Since arc faults probably start most fires, to me it's worth it. |
botulismo
Citizen
Username: Botulismo
Post Number: 102
Registered: 7-2001
| | Posted on Friday, November 7, 2003 - 2:25 pm: | |
Just like George said, you must have overloaded your circuit and tripped the breaker. You should look at what you have plugged into that circuit and what the circuit rated for. Pumps and motors need a little more juice to get started so something like the refrigerator cycling may be enough to overload a circuit that you are also using to make coffee and toast on.
Amps x Volts = Watts.
If your nominal voltage was 110/120 and the circuit was rated for 20 Amps, then the max watts on that line is a little over 2000 watts.
Typical ratings in watts:
Microwave oven - 1000 watts
Space heater 1,500 watts
Hair drier 1,200 watts
Electric range burner 1,000 watts
Refrigerator 1,000 watts
Computer and monitor 400 watts
Light bulb 60 watts
Show your electrician what you could expect to run. Electrical is the #1 source of fires in homes...
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jgberkeley
Supporter
Username: Jgberkeley
Post Number: 3285
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, November 8, 2003 - 12:53 am: | |
Warfrat,
In Electrical theory, changing the Circuit Breaker should not have made any difference. The size and the condition of the wires and the connections in the circuit did not change, and likely the load did not change.
However, that said, Circuit breakers do fail. It is not common, but it has been known to happen that a Circuit breaker just can’t take the load any more and what was a 15 amp breaker now starts to trip at 11 amps.
Just something to keep in mind.
Tourne,
Given what has been posted, neither you nor I can say what caused the problem. It could have been a temporary overload, a failing Circuit breaker, or a short that went away.
What is a short that went away? In many of these old houses, the old wires were not sized for the loads of today. Thus under the loads of today they draw many more Amps than they should. When that happens the wires get hot. When the wires get hot the old 50 year old insulation melts. That can allow a short to ground or neutral. Often when that happens, at the point of the short, metal melts away in the form of a spark, and oddly, when the metal melts away the short goes away. The new gap stops the problem.
Not the nice thing to hear, but it happens. I can not even begin to tell you how many electrical thing I have opened up to find the residue of a flash fire from the past.
BTW, unless you replace the wiring, installing an AFIC will not help much.
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wharfrat
Citizen
Username: Wharfrat
Post Number: 836
Registered: 6-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, November 8, 2003 - 8:29 am: | |
"In Electrical theory, changing the Circuit Breaker should not have made any difference. The size and the condition of the wires and the connections in the circuit did not change, and likely the load did not change.
However, that said, Circuit breakers do fail. It is not common, but it has been known to happen that a Circuit breaker just can’t take the load any more and what was a 15 amp breaker now starts to trip at 11 amps.
Just something to keep in mind."
Theory and practice converge, theory and practice also diverge. Stop by my house some time and I'll show you a couple of older breakers that failed because of long term heat build-up caused by aluminum wire.
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tourne
Citizen
Username: Tourne
Post Number: 222
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, November 8, 2003 - 9:08 am: | |
jg,
The new AFCI breakers are designed to detect an arc fault that may not have enough current to trip a regular breaker, but indeed can cause a fire by "slowly" arcing to ground or neutral. For instance, if you have a light that flickers intermittently, it may have an arc fault in the circuit. Faulty, sloppy wiring, old wiring, I would think are more apt to result in arc faults. The AFCI will not prevent the arc fault from happening--it will trip and turn it off before it starts a fire. |
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