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Posted by BETA-32 on November 18, 2006, 10:00 am
This probably doesn't explain it, but I don't believe in ghosts so I have to
come up with some other theory.
I think you could have a problem at the circuit breaker panel. One thing
you could try is to sniff around near the panel an see if you detect any
burning smell. Also, you could take the front cover off the panel and look
inside at the breakers and where they attach to the center bar. What I am
wondering is if you have a bad breaker that starts to arc and go bad as it
heats up. And, possibly that breaker is interacting with an adjacent
breaker.
I had a house where the occupants (not me) said the power went off, that
they turned the breakers off and on and it went back on, then a few days
later similar events took place. In each case, they hadn't turned anything
on or plugged anything in at the time of the power failure. I assumed that
something automatic like a refrigerator came on and tripped the breaker.
After the second time, they mentioned that there was a faint smell of
burning. I had them turn all of the power off and not reset any breakers.
An electrician looked at it (with me present) and showed me how there was a
defective main breaker and how the arcing had actually melted a portion of
the center bar that all of the breakers connect to. He replaced the main
breaker but had to relocate it to an area that wasn't melted. He said that
the problem probably was happening as the panel and breaker heated up, then
would correct itself and reset because it had cooled down when the breaker
was turned off.
So, just a thought, but definitely check it out.
>I dont understand this at all, and I have years of electrical
> experience.
>
> Last night I was doing some outdoor work after dark and I got out a
> trouble light. Everything was going fine until the light went
> out.When I grabbed it, the light came back on. OK, I figured the bulb
> was loose and attempted to tighten it. It seemed tight so I just hung
> it back where it was and started doing my work again. As soon as I
> started working again, the damn light went out again. I picked it up,
> and it came back on. I jiggled the switch a few times and the light
> remained on. I hung it up and started my work again. Sure enough,
> the light went out. This happened several more times, and I was
> getting quite pissed by then. I finally changed the bulb thinking the
> bulb was defective. I hung it back up and went back to work. You
> guessed it, the light went out. This time it stayed off, and I noticed
> that another light on that same circuit was also off. I checked the
> breaker and it was on. I then discovered that the GFI had tripped. I
> reset this GFI and went back to my work. Sure enough, the light went
> off, and once again the GFI tripped. By this time I was really angry,
> and I plugged the light into a non-gfi outlet. The light was working
> for a few minutes when all of a sudden it went off again. When I
> grabbed it, I heard that loud hum which indicates a direct short, and
> the breaker tripped. I unplugged the cord and threw that trouble light
> into the garbage, and got another one. That one worked fine, and I
> finiahed my work. (I had not turned the breaker back on, and I used a
> different outlet on another breaker.).
>
> When I finished my work, I took that defective light out of the trash
> and brought it in the house. I completely disassembled it, and found
> no broken or disconnected wires, no burn marks to indicate a short.
> I put it back together and tried it, and it worked fine. Even with
> the same bulb.
>
> Why did it trip the breaker? There are no loose or broken wires,
> nothing touching, and no burn marks to indicate a short. I also
> looked at the outlets and everything else that could have been the
> cause, and never found anything wrong.
>
> OK, this cord is haunted, I thought......
>
> Well, if you thing all of this is weird, it was the next day when I
> walked into the shed in the morning and found the ceiling light on.
> This light is on the same breaker that had blown, and I NEVER TURNED
> IT BACK ON. I live alone, and no one else had been here. THere was
> not even one of my cats in that shed. Yes, the breaker turned itself
> back on....... I am not joking about this, the breaker was back on and
> the ceiling light was on.
>
> I dont get it. This makes no sense whatsoever. I have had no further
> problems with that circuit or with that trouble light., and I even
> re-created the whole thing by placing the light into the same outlet,
> with the same bulb and everything works fine.
>
> W T F ?????
>
> Mark
>
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