peter d
Senior Member
- Location
- New England
Had an interesting service call today. Complaint of a breaker intermittently tripping and loss of power in a good bit of the house. We get there and see that the house has not been touched (electrically speaking) in decades. The panel is vintage FPE and most of the wiring is old BX. We turn on the offending circuit and hear a loud hum coming from the part of the basement. I get out my trusty T5 and see that the current shoots up to 65+ amps, but of course the trusty FPE breaker shows no sign of tripping. :roll: After a bit more sleuthing we find the offending short circuit in a DIY installed outdoor light gone wrong. All in all, I'm amazed that the house did not burn down with FPE breakers allowing high fault current (enough to make the cable hum) on old BX. Perhaps newer and more reliable breakers would have tripped faster but I'm not betting on it. :happyno: