Better safe than sorry! While your replacing the receptable replace the breaker TOO. I myself would try dead shorting the breaker just too see if it trips. Then replace it no matter what!
The reason I say short it is if that if the breaker doesnt the OTHER breakers in your panel may be bad too!!
!!!!If your panel is FPE!!!
Attention you have a known well documented fire hazard! The FPE stap lock breakers are TERRIBLE! just google FPE
REPLACE PANEL IMMEDIATELY!
What happens when it DOESN'T trip?
I know someone who lost a house (to fire) recently. From her description it could have involved those non-trip breakers.
imho:
You can have a high resistance connection that over heated. A practicle real world example is an electric heater. It's just one wire into a resistive material and back. Even thought much heat a break won't trip if the heater is set below the breaker's set point. So you might have had a a short that acted like a heater, it created a lot of heat, but the current flow was far below the setpoint.
Now this is a guess. The only way you can positive is to have either your system checked, or replace the breaker. So get an electrician.
tom @
Please note that this applies only to breakers manufactured in the US. The Federal Pioneer plants in other countries used different designs for their breakers/panels.
Around here (Saskatchewan, Canada) Federal Pioneer is still probably the most common brand of electrical panel.
Chris
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