Hi, we have a weird problem. We've been using our tumble dryer, a Indesit IS70C no problem for over a year but yesterday it tripped out the main circuit breaker in the house. Checked fuse in fused spur, wiring to the dryer socket and cleared out a ton of fluff from the dryer and especially around the connections within the dryer.
Power from socket to dryer is sound but when I switch on the dryer it trips everything immediately.
Checked all wiring I can see within dryer and appears sound. Wondered whether this model may have either a thermal trip or an internal fuse or some known problem causing it to trip.
One possibility - isolate drier, take off cover and check the main suppressor [aka as filter or capacitor] thingy in the drier. These can fail, causing the trip, though they can (at the 2nd or 3rd power-on) go on to blow completely. If it's failed, there may well be a visible sign around the suppressor case.
Sounds like somewhere in your tumble dryer is shorting to earth possibly. If you have access to a Megger, test between live and earth with the dryer switched on (but unplugged obviously).
Is it an RCD that its tripping out ? the slightest problem can trip an RCD out and tis last week has been very damp conditions, especially in garages,its a long shot but it may be damp in the socket!
As the whole house is going off, you presumably have a single RCD that covers the whole house. So you have an earth leakage problem with the drier.
When you say that it trips when you switch it on, I assume that you mean by turning the timer knob on the unit. In which case the fault is not in any filter (if present) where the supply enter the drier, but is either with the motor or heater. If you mean it trips when you turn it on at the wall, with the timer knob set to off, then it is probably a faulty filter, right where the supply enters.
Back to either a faulty heater or motor, if you can isolate the former by disconnecting the wires leading to it from, say, the timer switch, and run just the motor, that will show whether it is the motor or the heater.
If it is the motor, it may have an inline filter that may have gone faulty. If so, you may be able to disconnect the motor from that and see if it still trips - if so, change the filter.
What, of course, you really need is an insulation tester, to do the job without having to apply power at all. It will take a lot longer doing it without one - as the drier will need to be disassembled and reassembled between each test.
Do not, under any circumstances, be tempted to put power on with the unit in bits.
A drier is something that is likely to be used with wet or damp hands - there is a real risk of fatal electric shock from them. You have to balance that risk against the cost of getting it professionally repaired or at least professionally safety tested after you repair it.
Spent the day testing with a megger and took all these suggestions. Turns out it's the heater. I had no idea how to sort this so I finally admitted defeat and called in a pro.
I didn't tell him what I thought it was but he came to the same conclusion.
I'll be watching like a hawk so I can do it myself next time.
Thx to all. That was a bit of a mental workout. Get the f**k out to reply.
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