Strange home wiring problem (mud curse?) (1 Viewer)

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I've done alot of framing but that doesn't make me a furniture maker, if you're comfortable with that outdated panel more power to you, hey it's lasted this long what could possibly go wrong?

If you had training and experience building furniture, that would make you a furniture maker. I worked as an industrial electrician in the early 80's, when s*** like this was state-of-the-art. We built and wired stud walls with breaker panels for labs and offices, but it wasn't residential and my experience is way out of date. But it's certainly adequate to trouble-shoot this job.

My daughter is married, she and her husband will have to decide on the electrical panel. If they don't get a *real* electrician in to look at the issues noted by the inspector and me, I'll offer more advice, then keep my mouth shut. That's how parenting has to be.
 
With the shorting issue found, it is now a moderate to low priority issue. Yeah, it is more actions to turn off the whole house, but it can be done. The only part that isn't protected for shorts that would be protected by a mains breaker is inside the panel.
 
bogo the point for the main breaker as a safety issue, that if the smaller breakers in the panel do not trip the main will trip, when the guy installed my heat-pump, he had something messed up when he turned on the 40 amp breaker in the square D QO panel it tripped that breaker the main in the square d panel, and the main breaker in the GE main panel, but it did not trip the 100 amp GE breaker feeding my square D sup panel.
 
bogo the point for the main breaker as a safety issue, that if the smaller breakers in the panel do not trip the main will trip, when the guy installed my heat-pump, he had something messed up when he turned on the 40 amp breaker in the square D QO panel it tripped that breaker the main in the square d panel, and the main breaker in the GE main panel, but it did not trip the 100 amp GE breaker feeding my square D sup panel.

How would more than one breaker trip if they're all in series? Once the first breaker trips, the rest are getting no current. That sounds seriously messed up.
 
Yes I realize that, but there may be other more important repairs that need to be made to the house now.
 
no actually it is not the fault current hit at the max at the same time, instantaneous trip, it happens all the time. i have seen it a million times .
 
How would more than one breaker trip if they're all in series? Once the first breaker trips, the rest are getting no current. That sounds seriously messed up.
It relates to time delay of the breakers. It could easily have been a very high amperage spike as in a few hundred plus amps. The 100A didn't trip because it had a bit longer time delay than the other breakers had. They cut the circuit before it could react.
 
How would more than one breaker trip if they're all in series? Once the first breaker trips, the rest are getting no current. That sounds seriously messed up.

it worried me more that one breaker in the line did not trip, and why it did not did show its face about three years later!
 
no actually it is not the fault current hit at the max at the same time, instantaneous trip, it happens all the time. i have seen it a million times .

We've always called that an "I" trip in airplanes, seriously bad juju, lost generator and bus and bus tie breakers from a big spike. I've had all three systems do that together at night, and they all reset without another problem. It gets amazingly dark when that happens.
 
If you had training and experience building furniture, that would make you a furniture maker. I worked as an industrial electrician in the early 80's, when s*** like this was state-of-the-art. We built and wired stud walls with breaker panels for labs and offices, but it wasn't residential and my experience is way out of date. But it's certainly adequate to trouble-shoot this job.

My daughter is married, she and her husband will have to decide on the electrical panel. If they don't get a *real* electrician in to look at the issues noted by the inspector and me, I'll offer more advice, then keep my mouth shut. That's how parenting has to be.

and yet you still come on here and look for advice on basic wiring issues and how to run romex next to a chimney....don't get all quippy when you get opinions you don't like or agree with and then chastise Mud regulars for piling on when you post inane questions.
 
and yet you still come on here and look for advice on basic wiring issues and how to run romex next to a chimney....don't get all quippy when you get opinions you don't like or agree with and then chastise Mud regulars for piling on when you post inane questions.

Not a hell of a lot of chimneys surrounded by stud walls in factories, but it's very common in residential. So any residential electrician would probably know the answer, and everyone else would probably have no idea and no reason to judge the question inane. But still they pile on, because that's what they come here to do, don't you? Or did you know the answer from all your wiring experience and were just being coy with me? How sweet.
 
It relates to time delay of the breakers. It could easily have been a very high amperage spike as in a few hundred plus amps. The 100A didn't trip because it had a bit longer time delay than the other breakers had. They cut the circuit before it could react.

the 100 amp GE breaker was questionable then, but like i said 3 years later i lost one feed to my sub panel, turned out to be that same breaker, so when i pulled it out, it fell apart in my hands, being concerned that something was drawing more than 100 amps on that leg, i did amp probe test on it, and even with the heat pump, and air compressor kicking on at the same time, and every thing else in the panel on it spiked at about 85 amps on both legs, so i figured this was probably either due to that fault by the hvac guy or the breaker was questionable in the first place.
 
Scottm, there is a forum here for home improvement questions, you'd be better off posting there. Post in Chat, you get what you get. I know of at least one electrician on the forum who doesn't even visit chat that I'm aware of, but gives good advice in the home improvement section. Yeah, you'll get more traffic here, but not the kind you want.
 
Scottm, there is a forum here for home improvement questions, you'd be better off posting there. Post in Chat, you get what you get. I know of at least one electrician on the forum who doesn't even visit chat that I'm aware of, but gives good advice in the home improvement section. Yeah, you'll get more traffic here, but not the kind you want.

topgun loves the drama and toys4us is on the clock...
 
I didn't know there was a home improvement forum, I'll see about getting it moved there. Or just delete it, the problem is solved.
 
topgun loves the drama and toys4us is on the clock...

jesus, this statement read a bit different when I glanced at it.
 
Not a hell of a lot of chimneys surrounded by stud walls in factories, but it's very common in residential. So any residential electrician would probably know the answer, and everyone else would probably have no idea and no reason to judge the question inane. But still they pile on, because that's what they come here to do, don't you? Or did you know the answer from all your wiring experience and were just being coy with me? How sweet.

this will be my last post then you're going on ignore because you're such a pussy. Almost every house fire I've been on has either been food on the stove or electrical, of those I've pulled several charred bodies from the house after we put it out. I can do basic wiring, done tons of it even installed panels but if I have any question whatsoever I call an electrician, one that isn't a drunk especially because I know my limitations without proper training and I am not willing to put my family's lives on the line for ego's sake.
 

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