Since you seem to have isolated it to moisture problems in your garden lights, I would see if you can see where the water is getting in and seal them up. We have a lot of that type of thing here in Florida. I have found you want to open the wiring compartments, get all of the wires centered in the box is best you can so they are not touching the sides and pointing up so water tends to drain out of the connections.
It sounds like your electrical system was installed by an imbecile. A proper electrical system will work in all weather.
I no longer think that's the case. Now he says that only 1 of the 4 possible breakers that needs to be left off is for the garden lights. He doesn't know what the other 3 are for. That tells me that when any 1 of the other 3 breakers are left off, something(s) isn't working, but he has no idea what.
Seems to me that he might as well just leave those other 3 breakers off all of the time since they apparently have no impact on his life. *Then* he can fix the garden lights and never have a problem again.
Did he really say that he has over 50 breakers and no real clue what any of them (other than the garden light one) do? Holy crap.
He also says it happens when it rains. One thing I learned as an inspector is when a guy makes a mistake installing stuff, he does it a lot. With 50 circuits, there is a real good chance 4 of them feed wet location loads. I have a typical US service and I have at least half dozen circuits with an outdoor load.
I agree except that it's pretty strange that he says that it can be any
1 of 4 circuits that cause the main to trip, yet he only sees one that makes a difference - the one for the lights. Whatever "load" is getting wet on the other 3 is not known to him. The only thing I can think of is receptacles that he doesn't use and perhaps has not located. Testing them would be pretty easy once he locates them.It's also strange that - if I understand his explanation correctly - it's always only *1* of the 4 at any given time. With 4 possible circuits that can - and apparently do - get wet and cause the problem, why would it always be just a random 1 of them that causes the problem at any given time? Is the rain in Thailand selective?
My "suspicion" is any one , or possibly combination of 2, would cause the problem. Still don't know exactly what amperage the branch breakers are, but he has a 63 amp "sub-main" that trips. If he has 7.5 amp breakers (equivalent to 15 amp 120 volt) and he has 25 running an average of 1/4 capacity, that is 46.875 amps. Say the other 4 are at 6 amps each, the main may trip,(70 amps) while shutting any 1 off may keep it from tripping at 64. The "short" resistance in the 4 may not be exactly the same - one may draw heavier than the other on a given day (it IS a "random" fault) - so shutting all 4 off, then turning the others on, it may be different combinations that work from day to day.
I have uploaded two photos of the main breaker box. Please see:
Yes. You are right. One has a test button which doesn't work. I pressed it. The breaker wasn't tripped.
The closer I look at the main breaker box, the more confusion I get. At first, when I saw four breakers surrounding a main breaker, I assume they are parallel. But now, when I look at the cable connection, it seems to me the two Ground FL breakers are in serial, same for the other two First FL breakers.
I don't know why a 63A breaker is connected to another 63A breaker in serial.
Since I have turned off four breakers. Is there a way to find out what circuits they control? I can't turn them on because that would trip the sub-main breaker.
That's what I have been doing.
I don't own the house. My relative does.
Maybe there is a better way of saying it but what I meant was when a sub-main breaker was tripped, I turned off all breakers and flipped them one by one to find the culprit. When I found it, I marked it and turned it off. Next time when the sub-main breaker was tripped, I repeated the same procedure. So far, four breakers have been turned off and there is no more tripping.
Well, I have about 10 lights, one water heater (about 30 gallon), one ceiling fan, three refrigerators. When I turned on TV/DVD, used a kettle, turned on A/C, used the range in the kitchen, the breaker was not tripped. It would take a lot more than these to overload a 63A breaker.
The ones with 4 wires are RCDs
That's what I was thinking too. The bottom two have a 4th wire marked "N". A neutral going through a breaker would seem to indicate it's an RCD/gfci t ype breaker. Still don't understand all that's there, ie why there are seri es breakers, why there are 3 hots, etc. But agree that it's RCD and wet wir es, not overload that are causing the trips.
3 phase. It is not unusual on large services out there in 220v land
You have NO IDEA what amperage the other 4 (that cause the trip) are drawing. What is the rating of the branch circuit breakers? The water heater is likely 30 amps, the range is likely 40 amps (if it's all turned on). That is already more than 63 amps!!! If the range is off, it draws nothing, of course - but you do not indicate if it is in use. The fridges could be drawing 3.5 amps each - perhaps 7 when starting, and about the same when running the auto defrost cycle. When it kicked the kettle wa not in use? Or the AC? Were the lights on? With everything else turned off, can you turn on the 4 "bad" breakers without tripping the main?
Can't tell the rating of most of the breakers. The electrician who installed them did a great job labeling every one of them. The label sticker is right on the rating. Judging from the size of the breakers, they could be 13, 16, or 20 A.
My point of mentioning A/C, range, etc. was that besides those constantly on appliances, the breaker was not tripped when A/C or range was turned on. The breaker was tripped when A/C or range was not on. So, it kind of excludes overloading.
Now it turns out that the tripped sub-main breaker is a GFCI, a wet circuit is almost certain the cause of the problem.
If I turn on the bad breakers, the sub-main GFCI breaker will be tripped. Maybe not be immediately. Maybe in one or two days. To save the trouble, I just leave them off.
In a euro 240 style system I highly doubt most are over 7.5 amps.
\Being the sub-mains which are being tripped are GFCI breakers, you can bet the farm on it. No idea why they have such a ludicrous system
- the branch circuits should be GFCI protected.
I just checked eBay. The price is still around $50 a piece.
Maybe I should replace those four problematic breakers with GFCI, beside replacing the sub-main breaker.
Hello! McFly! Maybe you could buy a clamp-on amp meter and diagnose WTF is going on?
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