Home electrical problem

[Kingfisher]

I'm trying to replace some electrical outlets and switches on a 1973 vintage house. I turn all the breakers off but still have power in the kitchen. It's not an addition. What's going on?

 

[jltrent]

Recon one of the breakers could be malfunctioning. I would take the face off the breaker box or have and expert do it and test the outgoing wires individual after the breakers are turned off. Otherwise there is either another box or it is straight wired from the main breaker.

 

[JMJ Farms]

If all the breakers are off then it sounds like the current is coming from another source besides the panel box. Does it have a disconnect outside?

You could take a voltmeter and check each breaker to see if power is coming through the breaker even when it's off. Ive never seen this happen but it's possible.

Did you flip the main off? Did you still have current?

 

[Kingfisher]

No I didn't flip the main. My money on a junk breaker. They look original and feel worn out/loose. I suppose 40 plus years of surge would do that.... But who knows could be a wrong wired run.

 

[jltrent]

No I didn't flip the main. My money on a junk breaker. They look original and feel worn out/loose. I suppose 40 plus years of surge would do that.... But who knows could be a wrong wired run.

Some of those breakers can be hard to find on the older boxes. Check eBay as that was the only place I found one needed or an older electrical supply store that might have some or know were to get em.

 

[JMJ Farms]

A new breaker box is pretty cheap. Probably be a wise investment. Or either an old fuse panel box. People don't tend to like fuse boxes, but they are actually safer than a breaker. A breaker may not trip, but a fuse will blow every time it's overloaded.

 

[Kingfisher]

It's a pretty common upgrade in this neighborhood I think. It's a pretty simple deal for an electrician to "upgrade" the breaker box on one of these houses. Wire looks and works like good wire. Like I say my opinion is the 40 years of surges breaks em down.

 

[greybeard]

Make sure no one has tied a circuit straight in under your meter. It's happened before.

 

[Nesikep]

Try the main breaker before tearing your hair out.. if you still get power, there's something wonky in the wiring.

I'm guessing you've tried, but have you turned off ALL the smaller breakers? if you have, probe the output of each breaker (need to take the cover off for this).

If all else fails, hook up some load to the outlet in question.. enough that it would trip.. a couple 1500W loads should do it in a minute or less..
If you suspect a specific breaker, with an insulated screwdriver you can unscrew the wire going into it (or shut down the main) and retest.

Our house is 1935, wired in about 1955 by a farmer, and then rewired again in about 1970.. it's a real mess, and I have no plans to improve it

 

[Nesikep]

Also, a breaker that doesn't shut off when you flip the switch may still trip under an overload condition, they're kinda two different mechanical methods in them.. the 'switch' part operates a ratchet, and the pawls can wear/break, the electrical overload part heats a shaft that's 'glued' in with solder, when the solder melts, the ratchet mentioned above is free to rotate and this disconnects the power

What brand of breaker box is it?

 

[kjonesel]

When you were trying to identify the breaker that controlled the receptacle did you leave the breaker off? If you turned it off then back on when it didn't go off, then proceeded the same way through each breaker in the panel and it didn't go off then there is a good chance that circuit was double fed. What occurs is a power source comes into that circuit from two breakers and as long as they are on the same phase they won't trip. That is why it is important to leave the breaker off while searching for the correct one. This occurs more often than you think.

 

[hillbilly beef man]

Make sure no one has tied a circuit straight in under your meter. It's happened before.

Plus on an old house the most power would have been used in the kitchen. If I was going to steal power that would be the circuit that I would have as my freebie.

 

[greybeard]

Make sure no one has tied a circuit straight in under your meter. It's happened before.

Plus on an old house the most power would have been used in the kitchen. If I was going to steal power that would be the circuit that I would have as my freebie.

Well, I wasn't thininking about stealing power, but I guess that could have been a possibility some time in the past history of the house.
In the old house I grew up in, there was one 4 socket fuse box (screw in fuses) for the whole house. Pretty common.
Also common, if additional circuits were needed, to just install an extra set of lugs on the metered side of the meter box, run power off those lugs to a junction box of some kind and subcircuits from that box. Those circuits may or may not have any overload protection. When my father activated a big unused portion of the building for his auto shop, the "electrician" just pulled the meter and tied in on the 'outlet side' and ran 100A power back to the shop and split off in a big spaghetti looking junction box. Only thing that controled the shop circuits was a big knife type disconnect--IN the shop. One of the bedrooms of the house had a problem with it's wall outlets, (no voltage) and dad just took the wires off the outlets, taped them up, then ran power to those outlets from the other side of the wall, which was also the shop wall. That meant no protection for that bedroom outlet circuit, and no way to turn power off to that bedroom except the disconnect in the shop. You could pull all 4 fuses for the house and tht bedroom circuit would still be 'hot'.

 

[Brute 23]

You might want to turn off your main when you start swapping out breakers or get those gloves. Its a paper thin insulator between that breaker and the box.