- Location
- Tennessee NEC:2017
- Occupation
- Semi-Retired Electrician
I had a call from a customer saying some of his lights and receptacles were not working. He said he was washing out his garage from renters that kept dogs in there. He said he sprayed the walls, floor, ceiling, basically everything. I told him he most likely tripped a GFCI circuit and told him to look for either a receptacle or breaker that was a GFCI. He said he didn't find any tripped, breaker or receptacle. I explained how to reset them but that didn't help. So I went to check it out.
When I get there I see he has a 400A service with (2) 200A panels in the basement. I opened the panels and luckily they were labeled pretty good. I found the panel that contained the circuit(s) that he said wasn't working. Since he listed so many things that wasn't working I thought it better to see if all the breakers were set and working. What I found was none of the breakers had power. I checked the service wires on the line side and had power there but nothing on the load side. The main didn't look like it was tripped but I decided to exercise it anyway. I could not turn it all the way off. I noticed it had moisture coming from the inside around the handle. I finally turned it all the way to the on position and it held and powered the bus.
Obviously the breaker is defective since I couldn't turn it off and was very hard to turn it on. My question is could it have been the water in the circuits that caused the main to trip? Apparently he had washed down the basement too because it looked like it had been, plus the water I saw coming out of the main. Could direct spray into the panel trip the main? Even though I'm not sure it was tripped since it didn't look like it.
When I get there I see he has a 400A service with (2) 200A panels in the basement. I opened the panels and luckily they were labeled pretty good. I found the panel that contained the circuit(s) that he said wasn't working. Since he listed so many things that wasn't working I thought it better to see if all the breakers were set and working. What I found was none of the breakers had power. I checked the service wires on the line side and had power there but nothing on the load side. The main didn't look like it was tripped but I decided to exercise it anyway. I could not turn it all the way off. I noticed it had moisture coming from the inside around the handle. I finally turned it all the way to the on position and it held and powered the bus.
Obviously the breaker is defective since I couldn't turn it off and was very hard to turn it on. My question is could it have been the water in the circuits that caused the main to trip? Apparently he had washed down the basement too because it looked like it had been, plus the water I saw coming out of the main. Could direct spray into the panel trip the main? Even though I'm not sure it was tripped since it didn't look like it.