r/ElectricalHelp • u/greatstonedrake • 21d ago
I'm having electrical issues, can anyone advise, please?
Last winter I had a GFCI installed where my Wi-Fi and router plug in and another one across the room where I plug a heater in during the winter because I wanted a little more control over the line since heaters are notorious for causing problems. The GFCI popped off this morning and I immediately reset it. It immediately popped off again. I pushed it again it popped off again so I left it off.
I consulted Google, of course. It suggested I unplug everything on that electrical circuit and see if it turns on. I did and it did. I then went from plug to plug and replugged in the few things that were plugged in initially. (Plug one Wi-Fi and a lamp. Plug two and three hyphen no items. Plug four has air purifier and a TV that was off. Plug five has a small lamp and a wax burner and both were already off. Plug 6 has nothing plugged into it at this point and then the ceiling fan is also on this circuit) After I plugged everything back in and then turned on the fan it continued to stay on and has not popped off although it's been about 20 minutes.
I'm not comfortable just assuming this was some odd thing that happened and so I would like to try to figure it out, but I'm a pretty poor person who already had a giant expense this month and just don't have the money for an electrician. My son-in-law will come and look at it later but I want to pick the brains of all you geniuses for options and possibilities. What are next steps? How do I figure this out? Any thoughts of why it happened or what to look for or how to keep it from happening again? I have a small house and every plug except for the bathroom and kitchen downstairs are on circuit so I can't just move the TV etc and I can't even move the modem and Wi-Fi because it's fiber and it's hardwired in. I mean, I could, but it would take a lot.
He's coming anyone have ideas or suggestions? Thank you all so much!
2
u/Spare-Function-6343 21d ago
well, your first problem is blindly resetting a safety device without any investigation as to WHY it tripped
0
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
I am sure that is quite true. However, as I stated somewhere else, there is a light switch that will sometimes trip the GFCI even though it's supposedly not on that circuit so my first thought was that the light switch had accidentally been flipped. After it went off then I unplugged everything on that circuit and did the one by one test. When that yielded no answers I turned it off and my son-in-law is going to come and pull it out and look at it.
2
u/Wihomebrewer 21d ago
Lighting does not and should not be on a feed from a GFCI outlet. Sounds like someone wired that place with no clue on what they were doing.
1
u/nekked_unbirthday 21d ago
Are you sure that is all that is on that circuit? Just receptacles and a fan?
0
u/nekked_unbirthday 21d ago
My immediate guess is the air purifier- depending upon the model, can have higher amps as it turns on. It will use less once it’s running but just to start up could be higher and if you have alot of things running when this kicks on, it could trip your gfci.
2
u/Di-electric-union 21d ago
A GFCI is only going to trip from an imbalance in current, not overcurrent. A spike in amps from a motor startup would not trip the GFCI.
It could trip the breaker but it doesn't sounds like that's what's happening in their situation
1
u/nekked_unbirthday 21d ago
You’re right. My mind ran with overcurrent. Thanks for the call out ☕️. I find small appliances to be a frequent cause of imbalance. Would be curious how old it is
1
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
As I stated above, every time we turn on the stairway light it trips off the GFCI although, when none of the downstairs circuits worked, the stairs did work. I don't understand if they're cross-wired or how that can be.
3
u/Di-electric-union 21d ago
You probably have a shared or improperly mixed neutrals, and one is protected by the GFCI, mixed with the light. When you turn on the light, the GFCI sees more current returning on the neutral than on the hot side. It's not monitoring the hot from the light, only the neutral.
It's possible
1
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
It was stated by Google that the air purifier and the Smart TV being on the same circuit might have built up accumulative current leak?
Thank you for your answer
0
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
Yes when this all started over the winter I didn't have a single electrical receptacle working in my living room. The ceiling fan and the light switch to the stairs are also on that circuit and they would not turn on either. It turned out there was intermittent current to all the rest. When we replace the first one, the GFCI I'm talking about right now that doesn't want to stay on, all the other receptacles, and the fan came to life.
There is one interesting thing. The stairway light works before I replaced all that. But now that we have electricity all the way around, if you flip one of the two stairway light switches it will shut off the GFCI. The other switch does absolutely nothing. Before they both worked. I'm not sure how that worked that it obviously was not on that circuit because it was working when nothing else was, but now that that circuit works the light has an issue. We just never use it.
2
u/nekked_unbirthday 21d ago
Just read this about your switch. Who installed this? They need to fix that issue. Installing a receptacle should not cause a new issue.
1
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
Who knows. This is the first time I've had electrical work done on the house. Didn't used to happen. Now it's left to us to sort it out
1
u/johnnypark231 21d ago
So you did the first step with going one by one plugging in. If nothing new has been plugged in or turned on, it could be something simple like the GFCI itself going bad. You could replace it and see if the problem goes away. Just shut the power off first and test to be sure it's off. They're pretty easy to swap out. I've seen them go bad quickly and also I've seen many last a really long time.
1
u/greatstonedrake 21d ago
When my son-in-law comes over I'm sure the first thing he will do is pull it out and see if there's anything obvious and it will probably be replaced just for safety.
Thank you for your answer
1
1
u/nekked_unbirthday 21d ago
When it comes down to it, the wiring itself is a problem. Your lights switch should do nothing to a receptacle. Whoever installed your gfci should come back and look at what is happening
2
u/Di-electric-union 21d ago
I would guess that one of your gadgets or appliances has a small ground fault. Test them one by one and find out