GFCI pops only when freezer is plugged in

[toddeus]

The freezer is just a couple months old, energy star name brand & all has been fine until today. We had rain & wind last night, but the freezer's in the garage plugged into a socket on an interior wall. Just today I noticed that the freezer was off, & found the GFCI was popped. It would reset for some seconds, then pop again when the freezer was turned back on. Nothing else different was on the line, & no other higher volt using appliances were running when the GFCI kept popping. I plugged the freezer into a different outlet in the garage using an extension cord, reset the GFCI, & all is well. The GFCI hasn't popped since. Is this a bad GFCI or ? ? ? ? Many thanks, homeowners.

[Ralph Mowery]

"toddeus" wrote in message news:37e1a$53017772$cf3aab60$ [e-mail]...

Freezers and refrigerators should not be plugged into a GFCI. They may trip and the food will spoil.

Get a few items that draw a reasonable current such as the electric heaters or anything else with a 3 wire plug ( two wires plus the ground) . Plug them into the GFCI socket and see if it trips. That should tell you if it is the receptical or something else.

[gfretwell]

If it is that new, turn it in on a warranty complaint. It is defective,.A properly operating freezer or refrigerator will not trip a GFCI. My bet is the compressor is bad (internal short) and they usually have a 10 year warranty.

Do not let them bullshit you that they are supposed to trip GFCIs. They are not and as of the 2014 code, you will have GFCI or AFCI (30ma GF) protection on every outlet in your house.

[philoÂÂ]

Correct. The freezer apparently has leakage to ground. You said there was a lot of rain and it's in the garage, so the interior might have gotten wet. Otherwise it's defective.

The only other possibility is that the outlet itself is defective or got wet.

[willshak]

That happened to me a few times after storms. In my case, it was an outside outlet that was on the same circuit as a refrigerator in the garage. The rain blew into the outside outlet popping the fuse. I waterproofed the outside outlet and it hasn't happened since.

[trader4]

That's what I thought too, given the fact that it happened during wind and rain. But, the rest of his description, would seem to rule that out. He said if he resets it with the fridge plugged in, it runs for some seconds then quits. If he doesn't have the fridge plugged in, then it will stay reset. IDK how a wet outlet somewhere down the line could cause that.

As an experiment, if has a long enough extension cord, he could try plugging the fridge into some other GFCI outlet as a test and see what happens.

[toddeus]

Wow! Thanks for all the speedy replies, folks. Just to clarify, the fridge is downstream of the actual GFCI outlet, which is in the master bath. Yeah, we do have some plugs outside with covers where rain could have gotten in, or general moisture. No water at all in the garage. How do you tell what outlets are in the circuit of a particular GFCI outlet? We have at least 3 GFCI's that I know of without hardly thinking, would have to go look around to see if there's others. Did I say that the freezer is plugged into a different non-GFCI garage outlet via ext cord? It's been running fine since yesterday, so that's about

15+ hours without a glitch. Again, many thanks. Happy Pres Day!

Todd

[DerbyDad03]

Press the test button and then go test each outlet. The ones that are dead are the ones on that GFCI.

What is not clear to me is whether or not that non-GFCI receptacle is downstream and protected by the suspect GFCI. If you press the test button on the suspect GFCI does that receptacle go off?

Still not clear of the status of the current receptacle that you are using. Is is protected by the same GFCI that was giving you trouble?

BTW you probably should not leave the freezer plugged into an extension cord. At a minimum, it should be a good quality, fairly short extension cord of sufficient gauge to handle the freezer. In other words, I hope it's not your basic $2.99 zip cord extension cord.

[gfretwell]

If you really want to prove it is the freezer, drag that extension cord to another GFCI and try it.

[trader4]

Then it would seem the next thing to do would be to replace the GFCI. It may be defective and is tripping for no reason.

[DerbyDad03]

...snip...

Well, it has to be tripping for _some_ reason. There's always a reason. ;-)

[hrhofmann]

been fine until today. We had rain & wind last night, but the freezer's in the garage plugged into a socket on an interior wall. Just today I noticed that the freezer was off, & found the GFCI was popped. It would reset for some seconds, then pop again when the freezer was turned back on. Nothing e lse different was on the line, & no other higher volt using appliances were running when the GFCI kept popping. I plugged the freezer into a different outlet in the garage using an extension cord, reset the GFCI, & all is wel l. The GFCI hasn't popped since. Is this a bad GFCI or ? ? ? ? Many thanks, homeowners. --

It is possible that there is some outdoor outlet leakage, not enuf to trip the gfci by itself, but adding a little more leakage from the freezer is en ouf to trip it. All other comments are more or less correct

[gfretwell]

That is why I suggested dragging that extension cord to another GFCI and try it there. He doesn't have 2 bad GFCIs.