Certain outlets have gone dead (Breakers all in tact)

[William.Deans]

Greetings Toller,

This is possible. Imagine the following counterexample.

two breakers in use

12-3 connected to both breakers (shared neutral) 15 A breaker on pole B in slot 2 of breaker box (red) 20 A breaker on pole A in slot 19 of breaker box (black) 12-3 wire runs to living room into junction box 15 A circuit from junction box feeds living room lights (red circuit) 20 A circuit from junction box feed living room receptacles (black circuit) 12-3 continues on to bathroom into second junction box 15 A circuit from junction box feeds bathroom fan (red circuit) 20 A circuit from junction box feeds receptacles (black circuit)

If someone drove a nail through the shared neutral after the living room but before the bathroom the living room would continue to work (both circuits) but the bathroom would experience 240V and the fan / GFCI receptacles might appear dead.

I don't pretend to claim that this is what is happening. I only want to point out that what the poster claims is entirely possible.

Hope this helps, William

[RJM]

My wife was using the vacuuming and what seemed like a simple act of circuit breaker's just doing their job has turned into a mystery to me.

All circuit breakers are on. The outlets that are affected are NOT even on the same circuit (i know this from the breakers go off in the past), and some of the outlets that I know are on the same breakers as the ones that don't work are working fine.

I have two GFI outlets (one in each bathroom) and one works fine and one does not. I am truly stumped.

Any help would be appreciated.

[James]

Your first step should be to make 100 % certain that ALL breakers are ON.

Many breakers LOOK like they are on, but they have tripped, and have only moved a tiny bit. The best way to be sure is to turn each one of them all the way to OFF and then turn them back on.

Good luck !!

--James--

[John Grabowski]

Not too much information to go on, but it is possible that you have a loose or broken wire somewhere on the line. Start at the electrical panel and tighten all connections on the circuit breakers and the neutral bar. While you are in there check to see that you are actually getting "Juice" off of each circuit breaker.

If that doesn't resolve the problem, the next step would be to open up each receptacle, switch, and light fixture on that particular circuit in search of a broken or loose connection. The problem could even be in a receptacle that is still working.

If you are not comfortable doing this, I suggest that you call in an electrician.

John Grabowski

[RJM]

Yes i do believe that is what has happened and here is why I think this way. A few months back (again while vacuuming) a circuit breaker tripped and shut off an air conditioner that was on the first floor and one above it on the second floor (clock radio and light were also plug into the upstairs outlet & went off). I flipped the circuit breaker back on and all was fine. So I know (or guess) that they are on the same curcuit. This time the air conditioner up stairs is now off (along with clock radio and light) but the air conditioner on the first floor (and it's outlet) are working fine. Now, if you say this is pretty impossible than maybe I may not remembering the facts correctly and of course the labeling on the breaker box is written in sand script. I will flip the breakers on and off tomorrow and see if my memory is fading or not.

[toller]

What John says is certainly the way to go about it, but... You claim that several outlets on different circuits stopped working simultaneously, but other outlets on those circuits still work. Is that right? Well, except as a bizarre coincidence, that's not possible. If you are sure it is what happened, I suggest you get an electrician ASAP for fear something really perverse is going on. If they simply stopped working the same week, or something than that, then follow John's advice.

[Around]

[Joseph Meehan]

I hope you don't have aluminum wiring.

[dadiOH]

Reset the GFIs?

[Jeff Wisnia]

Second that!

Jeff

[Chris Lewis]

According to [e-mail] :

Something similar to that would happen, but not the way you describe. On the side with a switched on device, the voltage would appear to be zero (hot-neutral). On the side with _no_ switched on devices, the voltage would appear to be 240V (hot-neutral). Hot-ground would be

120V.

If _both_ sides had something switched on, the _lighter_ load side would see > 120V (hot-neutral), and the _higher_ load side would see < 120V (hot-neutral). Hot-ground would be 120V.

And finally, if _nothing_ was switched on, a hot-neutral voltage reading could be anything (neutral is floating), and a hot-ground test would be 120V.

I suspect the real situation is that it&#39;s a simple 120V circuit, the line itself is broken somewhere (instead of the breaker off), and he&#39;s assuming that since what he already saw go off with one breaker, and _now_ some of it is on, and some of it is off, that the original fault was multiple breakers, and now he&#39;s seeing a single.

Or simply that he&#39;s forgetting which is which and has gotten confused.

It certainly does seem like the circuit is overloaded (running a vacuum AND A/C and other things on the same line is just asking for it).

I&#39;d assume it&#39;s a _single_ line break, ignore the previous suppositions, and work at tracing exactly what the routing really is. Checking for opens in the boxes is the right thing, but it could be in a box that still seems live - hence tracing may still be necessary.

[maradcliff]

If you have a volt meter, chek the voltage on each breaker. Sometimes breakers go bad.