Hi everybody . Can you please help me this breaker is driving me crazy . I have a 20 amp combo afci /gfi and it works until you turn on anything on the circuit light fan it doesn't matter this thing is so sensitive . Already changed out breaker and same problem I have to pass inspection so there's no other way around it . If you have any input or passed experiences please let me know . Thanks !
Afci keeps tripping help!
- Thread starter gabe277
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justdavemamm
Senior Member
- Location
- Rochester NY
Pure speculation would be that the return neutral is grounded out somewhere. Or that the hot after the switch is grounding. Time to use a meter and track it down.
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A afci breaker will trip on any outlet even if it is not a problem with that outlet.You have a Loose conection somewhere on that circuit or a netural and ground touching. Start with the end{LAST} device and work back to the first. or if you have a juction box unhook and reconect one line at a time till you find the problem. Any type of loose conection or touching on netural to ground might cause this check for insulation not striped back and under screw even a spaple driven to tight or a nail in wire I have had all of the above cause this problem. hope this helps as you work with these more you will get better at it
shepelec
Senior Member
- Location
- Palmer, MA
Pull the neutral and do an ohms check to the ground. Sounds like a ground/ neutral issue.
- Occupation
- Licensed Electrician
Gabe, is there a box with more than one circuit in it?
$50 bucks says it's a bootleg neutral. If it were a ground to neutral fault the breaker would not reset.
$50 bucks says it's a bootleg neutral. If it were a ground to neutral fault the breaker would not reset.
brian john
Senior Member
- Location
- Leesburg, VA
Megger the circuit, divide and conquer.
Howard Burger
Senior Member
- Location
- N of Anchrage, AK
Pos. mwbc?
Pos. mwbc?
Gabe, your original post didn't mention this and you've probably already thought of it, but you're not running a mwbc to that afci, are you? The shared neutral on mwbc will cause the afci to trip.
Pos. mwbc?
Gabe, your original post didn't mention this and you've probably already thought of it, but you're not running a mwbc to that afci, are you? The shared neutral on mwbc will cause the afci to trip.
ok thank you everybody for your input ok before i stuck the afci breaker in there , I had a 20 amp regular bereaker and everything worked fine as soon as i stuck this afci breaker BAM trip only when the light switch or fan or any load on the circuit . with no load the breaker was fine ..... but my question is does the afci breaker sense the bonded nuetral to ground connectin at the box ?
Oh and no theres not a multiwire branch . tightened up alll connnections and stilll no luck
so your saying maybe the nuetral is going to ground at the fan or light .I installed a afci that starts with the letter g in a house no prob then i get this sd one and problems everywhere . once again thanks for input guys
Oh and no theres not a multiwire branch . tightened up alll connnections and stilll no luck
so your saying maybe the nuetral is going to ground at the fan or light .I installed a afci that starts with the letter g in a house no prob then i get this sd one and problems everywhere . once again thanks for input guys
e57
Senior Member
- Location
- San Francisco, CA
Without drawing a picture.... Odds are you or one of your guys tied the neutral to either ground - or another neutral in the circuit. Short of it being that, some would say you have a nick in the wiring.... (A true ARC FAULT) But it would be a rare deal for most to find one of those outside of a controlled manufacturer sponsored test.... Ring out the neutral isolated from ground in each portion of the circuit - once that is eliminated. Log what actual loads trip the breaker - motors/fans vs say incandescent lighting vs. non incandescent lighting - in the past I have had many types of variable speed motors or controls trip AFCI's - in fact they were just as fickle as when GFCI's first came out. (When no florescent load was going to hold on them very long...) Some manufactures actually put out lists of appliances that would trip AFCI's - suggesting using/purchasing something else on their faulty bogus mandatorily required (wasn't ready for prime time before they paid the NFPA to make it the law) equipment.
e57
Senior Member
- Location
- San Francisco, CA
Yes - it is a glorified GFCI breaker that supposedly senses some specific types of voltage spikes that would signify they being an arcing condition - but yes - if there is a neutral to ground leak, i.e. current leaking to ground as sensed in the typical GFCI circuit - it will trip.
hurk27
Senior Member
- Location
- Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
You have a grounded neutral, whither intentionally or not, the symptoms are that when you apply a load it will trip, this also will occur if the neutral gets tied into another circuits neutral, ITE's and a few other breakers will react like this.
the easiest way to check this is turn off the breaker, remove the neutral from the breaker (you did connect this circuits neutral to the AFCI breaker didn't you) measure the continuity between the neutral and the neutral bar, if you get a reading then you have a grounded neutral or its tied to another neutral, to test to see if you have it tied to another neutral, then remove any neutrals that might share a common junction box, if this removes the continuity, then look for that common junction point, if not its grounded, which if you know the circuit, go a junction close to the center point in the circuit and break the neutrals apart, if it open the connection then its between this point and the panel, if not its after this point, and you have just saved taking half of the circuit apart, also just remember to turn off any circuits before you remove any neutrals from the neutral bar or junctions.
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Ok this rebuild has been an ongoing project , the costomer told me that it was a hurricane Ike total rebuild and that the contractors he hired ran offf on him , and now hes just trying to finish so here i am the panel was mounted already wires ready to land and the whole house seemed liked it just needed to be trimmed out . welll guesss again the other electrician left a mess and about three homeruns never made it back to the panel . its a night mare but I have to finish . so I committed and now i Have to finish plus the costumer he understands and just wants me to do what i have to do so we can get his mom moved in . so long story short the GC was was originally the roofer then somehow he wound up being the contractor and left with 60 0000 and never came back .
Ok thanks for te input on the afcis i havent dealt with them much . Yes I did hoook up the nuetral to the afci and the curly white neutral to the nuetral bar . but Im going to try what you say disconnect the neutral from the breaker and ohm it out to the bar and i guess if we get contnuity then we can remove one neutral at a time until it stops . ok thats a goood idea .
growler
Senior Member
- Location
- Atlanta,GA
I'm willing to bet that the homeowner is actually the GC of record for this job otherwise there would be a new GC hired to permit the job until finished.
Check and see who holds the permit for the job.
I have been involved in several of these type jobs and it's normally when a homeowner thinks they can just turn a bunch of subs loose on the job and it will be finished correctly.
shepelec
Senior Member
- Location
- Palmer, MA
- Location
- Illinois
- Occupation
- retired electrician
That is almost always an indication of a parallel path for neutral current, assuming the load is not causing an arc.Actualy the breaker resets and holds until a load is applied.
cadpoint
Senior Member
- Location
- Durham, NC
I went back and noted that you only posted this last night, please don?t take offense!
From what I read, if the circuit of fan is the only thing that is tripping the AFCI than you need to bring a test circuit to the fan and see if the fan is faulting the AFCI!
If the fan works with this test then the fan is OK, it?s backwards from that point. That is not my only suggestion.
All of the following are good suggestions:
# 3
# 4
# 5 You did State you did this - tried a regular breaker.
# 6
# 7 Sounds like the real problem based on your description of the job from your post # 15 & some of # 16
IE You only tighten up the circuit joints, You didn?t qualify a truly ?individual? circuit.
# 8 The mother of all tests? The meggar. One megger the wires not the AFCI.
# 9 You stated it?s not its not a MWBC
# 11 - #12 (also referencing #7) a real key to why a AFCI will not work on multi circuits/ shared circuit neutrals (two circuits sharing a neutral), or wires touching in some fashion. Now since it?s not a MWBC or a Rated Dual Breaker, it can stay in for ?Cause of Fault??
# 13 - it?s the Junk Fan - if could have been damaged, it has improper internal wiring or damaged after install of fan! An example is nicked neutral wire in the throat of the raceway inside the fan.
# 14 - Testing with POWER OFF an Ohm Meter, and the wire off the circuit breaker. almost the same as using a megger, just depends on where the wire nicked in # 7 it, on how the fault reading would show up!
(for the purist I realize their completely two different types of tests)
#15 - #16 JOB DRAMA that don?t fix the issue(?s) at hand, but it really sounds like you need to ID and totally understand every circuit and it distribution. It is a hatchet job and several types of hatchets where used to put it together, which is reflective of what was said in # 17
The following is a list that just frankly need to be done.
# 7, # 8, # 11, # 12, # 13, # 14 and One could probably do everything except # 8 and find the problem, it will be just about the same amount of work but if you don?t have the meggar, well you don?t?
Or what was said in #19 and also said in other posts?
My thoughts on it; AFCI = ARC Fault Circuit Interrupt; We should remember it as ARC Fault Circuit INDIVIDUAL !
It takes an individual circuit (one), IE a complete circuit, nothing shared to the equipment and or devices for the AFCI not to trip.
Hope that helps!
From what I read, if the circuit of fan is the only thing that is tripping the AFCI than you need to bring a test circuit to the fan and see if the fan is faulting the AFCI!
If the fan works with this test then the fan is OK, it?s backwards from that point. That is not my only suggestion.
All of the following are good suggestions:
# 3
# 4
# 5 You did State you did this - tried a regular breaker.
# 6
# 7 Sounds like the real problem based on your description of the job from your post # 15 & some of # 16
IE You only tighten up the circuit joints, You didn?t qualify a truly ?individual? circuit.
# 8 The mother of all tests? The meggar. One megger the wires not the AFCI.
# 9 You stated it?s not its not a MWBC
# 11 - #12 (also referencing #7) a real key to why a AFCI will not work on multi circuits/ shared circuit neutrals (two circuits sharing a neutral), or wires touching in some fashion. Now since it?s not a MWBC or a Rated Dual Breaker, it can stay in for ?Cause of Fault??
# 13 - it?s the Junk Fan - if could have been damaged, it has improper internal wiring or damaged after install of fan! An example is nicked neutral wire in the throat of the raceway inside the fan.
# 14 - Testing with POWER OFF an Ohm Meter, and the wire off the circuit breaker. almost the same as using a megger, just depends on where the wire nicked in # 7 it, on how the fault reading would show up!
(for the purist I realize their completely two different types of tests)
#15 - #16 JOB DRAMA that don?t fix the issue(?s) at hand, but it really sounds like you need to ID and totally understand every circuit and it distribution. It is a hatchet job and several types of hatchets where used to put it together, which is reflective of what was said in # 17
The following is a list that just frankly need to be done.
# 7, # 8, # 11, # 12, # 13, # 14 and One could probably do everything except # 8 and find the problem, it will be just about the same amount of work but if you don?t have the meggar, well you don?t?
Or what was said in #19 and also said in other posts?
My thoughts on it; AFCI = ARC Fault Circuit Interrupt; We should remember it as ARC Fault Circuit INDIVIDUAL !
It takes an individual circuit (one), IE a complete circuit, nothing shared to the equipment and or devices for the AFCI not to trip.
Hope that helps!
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