Any good troubleshooting books available?

[retirede]

I originally thought my post was a dud, since it did not receive a response right away. But thanks to everyone that has responded.

You asked for a book recommendation, they wrote you one.

 

[petersonra]

I think it kind of depends on what kind of troubleshooting you think you want to do. All of them will require a solid understanding of ohms law and arithmetic associated with it. You will also need to have to be able to instinctively use common instruments like voltmeters without having to think about it all that much.

Beyond that it kind of depends on what type of troubleshooting you want to do. Learn as much as you can about how the stuff is supposed to actually work so when it doesn't work you know at least where to start looking.

This is one of those cases where book learning will do you a lot of good and all the experience in the world probably won't help you much if you can't read the instruction manual and understand it.

 

[James L]

You asked for a book recommendation, they wrote you one.

No cost e-book

 

[James L]

Don’t know if your experience has been new, ground up construction, but that is one of the best ways to learn troubleshooting. If you know how it was put together to begin with, it makes it a whole lot easier to troubleshoot.

This one right here.

 

[James L]

Hello all,
I will be applying for a job soon that will require a lot of troubleshooting type work. I have several years experience in residential and light commercial electrical work. My trouble shooting skills are definitely lacking. Can anyone direct me to a online course or possibly a good troubleshooting book? Any information is appreciated.

This may be a tough pill to swallow but if your troubleshooting skills are lacking, you really have no business applying for a job that will require a lot of troubleshooting. You'll be very slow, and get stumped too often

Most of your troubleshooting skills are going to come from doing new construction and paying attention to methodologies.

Next is remodel wiring, and again paying attention to methodologies. Learning how it was done in various eras helps a lot.

I was fortunate to have worked with some old timers when I first started learning new construction. They taught me stuff I would never have learned from younger electricians.

Also fortunate that after 2 years experience I found a weekend job doing fire jobs. I got to see a lot of older stuff and see it with walls gutted out.

 

[kwired]

May I add to all the above:

Learn to break the problem down into manageable 'chunks'.

Example: the light doesn't come on when the switch is 'ON'.

( I guess maybe substituting a known good lamp might be the first step, but anyway....)

Break it as close to half-way as possible, for example, at the load side of the breaker........do you have voltage on the load wire no matter what the position of the switch? stick a known load on it ( 100 W lamp, drill, etc), do you still have voltage ? if so, you have eliminated everything 'upstream' as a possible cause.

Then break the remaining half in half........say at the switch terminals

I think you can all see what I'm trying to say.

Oh, and NEVER go into troubleshooting a problem with a pre-conceived notion of 'what might be wrong'.........trust only what you can see and verify (and don't always trust your meters, etc; more than once 'they' have let me down.......)

Thank you all for your patience

Occasionally it is as simple as "did you turn it on" or "did you plug it in" or first thing you do is walk up to a GFCI and press the reset button.

Then other times pressing that reset button seems to solve issues but then it keeps tripping, maybe not right away though.

 

[garbo]

Hello all,
I will be applying for a job soon that will require a lot of troubleshooting type work. I have several years experience in residential and light commercial electrical work. My trouble shooting skills are definitely lacking. Can anyone direct me to a online course or possibly a good troubleshooting book? Any information is appreciated.

 

[garbo]

This may be a tough pill to swallow but if your troubleshooting skills are lacking, you really have no business applying for a job that will require a lot of troubleshooting. You'll be very slow, and get stumped too often

Most of your troubleshooting skills are going to come from doing new construction and payingM attention to methodologies.

Next is remodel wiring, and again paying attention to methodologies. Learning how it was done in various eras helps a lot.

I was fortunate to have worked with some old timers when I first started learning new construction. They taught me stuff I would never have learned from younger electricians.

Also fortunate that after 2 years experience I found a weekend job doing fire jobs. I got to see a lot of older stuff and see it with walls gutted out.

 

[garbo]

Many years ago the electrician that I was a helper to told me to get good at troubleshooting because any one can run conduit and pull heavy wires all day. He told me to divide & conquer. If you had a short on a circuit that had 10 receptacles try to go to middle of circuit and disconnect last 5 receptacles. Some times a VOM meter will not pick up a problem so this works well. Pays to have good quality meters ( 1000 VOLT VOM, Amp meter, and a 1000volt Megger if working on 480 volt motors. A cheap temperature gun until you can afford an IR camera ). I worked on hundred of drives and would call their service department when I could not get the VFD running. Some times it was as easy as changing one of the parameters. Have to be extra careful when jumping out safety devices. Our engineer had my dad jump out all of the safeties on a large boiler while talking to service guy on the phone. My easy going dad at first refused but engineer told him it was okay. Anyway boiler filled with gas then blow out so hard blow off my dad's work shoe. Engineer asked where my dad was. Told him he went down to the bar to settle his nerves. Engineer said but your dad does not drink. Well he drank that day. Some times after hours of troubleshooting best to just walk away for a few minutes go sit down and drink a coffee or a soda and stop thinking about problem. Can not tell you how many times I have done this and within minutes located the problem. Intermittent problems are by far the hardest to troubleshoot. Would have a large piece of equipment that had halve a dozen stop buttons along with a dozen micro switches that could shut it down.
Could be a loose connection or even a micro switch that was slightly out of adjustment. Have to watch genetic prints. You can have 10 pages of prints that show every option under the sun. When I found missing switches, lights, solenoids etc would use a pencil and X that part out.

 

[kwired]

Many years ago the electrician that I was a helper to told me to get good at troubleshooting because any one can run conduit and pull heavy wires all day. He told me to divide & conquer. If you had a short on a circuit that had 10 receptacles try to go to middle of circuit and disconnect last 5 receptacles. Some times a VOM meter will not pick up a problem so this works well. Pays to have good quality meters ( 1000 VOLT VOM, Amp meter, and a 1000volt Megger if working on 480 volt motors. A cheap temperature gun until you can afford an IR camera ). I worked on hundred of drives and would call their service department when I could not get the VFD running. Some times it was as easy as changing one of the parameters. Have to be extra careful when jumping out safety devices. Our engineer had my dad jump out all of the safeties on a large boiler while talking to service guy on the phone. My easy going dad at first refused but engineer told him it was okay. Anyway boiler filled with gas then blow out so hard blow off my dad's work shoe. Engineer asked where my dad was. Told him he went down to the bar to settle his nerves. Engineer said but your dad does not drink. Well he drank that day. Some times after hours of troubleshooting best to just walk away for a few minutes go sit down and drink a coffee or a soda and stop thinking about problem. Can not tell you how many times I have done this and within minutes located the problem. Intermittent problems are by far the hardest to troubleshoot. Would have a large piece of equipment that had halve a dozen stop buttons along with a dozen micro switches that could shut it down.
Could be a loose connection or even a micro switch that was slightly out of adjustment. Have to watch genetic prints. You can have 10 pages of prints that show every option under the sun. When I found missing switches, lights, solenoids etc would use a pencil and X that part out.

Divide and conquer is good, but if something looks suspicious before even digging into it, that may be the first point to open up even if not in the middle of a chain. You can still sometimes take measurements or whatever and know which way to go next if that point wasn't the problem.

I also have left site without solving problem, usually intending to do some research on what to try next, sometimes what to do next just comes to me while on the drive home.

 

[LarryFine]

I just posted this in another thread:

Wire a high-wattage incandescent bulb in series with the breaker and the circuit wire. That will act as a current-limiter to allow the breaker to stay on while troubleshooting, and will act as an instantaneous current indicator.



Have a helper watch the light and immediately report any flicker or change in brightness. If you're working alone, you can wire in a receptacle instead, and use an extension cord and a lamp to have the indicator light near you.

 

[kwired]

I just posted this in another thread:

Wire a high-wattage incandescent bulb in series with the breaker and the circuit wire. That will act as a current-limiter to allow the breaker to stay on while troubleshooting, and will act as an instantaneous current indicator.

View attachment 2559539

Have a helper watch the light and immediately report any flicker or change in brightness. If you're working alone, you can wire in a receptacle instead, and use an extension cord and a lamp to have the indicator light near you.

In fuse panels that have Edison base fuses you could just screw the lamp into the fuse holder.

Bulb burning bright means short circuit conditions in the branch circuit.
Dim bulb is because it is in series with a load in the branch circuit.

 

[HoosierSparky]

Don’t know if your experience has been new, ground up construction, but that is one of the best ways to learn troubleshooting. If you know how it was put together to begin with, it makes it a whole lot easier to troubleshoot. The journeyman I started out with, had a saying when troubleshooting somebody else’s work, “If I was an idiot electrician, what would I have done?”LOL!

and THEN torque the neutrals in the panel. That fixes a lot of the issues I run across!

 

[LadyDi]

Additional tip: Use a solenoid voltage tester, not a voltmeter, when you want to test for the presence of real power, not for a specific voltage. My favorite is the Knopp K60:

View attachment 2559221

Oh my! Is that a wiggy?

 

[LadyDi]

Hello all,
I will be applying for a job soon that will require a lot of troubleshooting type work. I have several years experience in residential and light commercial electrical work. My trouble shooting skills are definitely lacking. Can anyone direct me to a online course or possibly a good troubleshooting book? Any information is appreciated.

I feel like the answer to your question is "that depends. " What type of work do you plan on troubleshooting?

Additionally, I agree with the folks that suggest a good base of theory with critical thinking goes a long way. Lol. For this, I recommend Mike Holt's Basic Electrical Theory Book (ISBN-10:1932685391). For building critical thinking concepts, try The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking ISBN-10: 1538134942. Finally, for controls, I like the Second Edition Electricians Guide to AC Motor Controls by Richard A. Cox.

 

[LarryFine]

Oh my! Is that a wiggy?

Functionally the same. Knopp K-60.

 

[LadyDi]

I used a wiggy for years and loved it!

 

[LadyDi]

Nice.

 

[LadyDi]

Oh my! Is that a wiggy?

Do you mean when you want to just check if the circuit is live?

 

[LarryFine]

Do you mean when you want to just check if the circuit is live?

A voltmeter is susceptible to false readings due to capacitance from energized conductors, while a solenoid tester requires enough current to bring down induced voltage. They're also good GFCI testers.