mfinn
Surgeonfish
I posted this in the water water fountain forum, but realized it may not be seen there so I reposted it here.
I don't know if anyone has experienced this before, but yesterday evening about about 5:30 half my house suddenly lost power. It was the side that doesn't have my reef tank on it.
I went to the breaker box and looked for a popped breaker. Nothing was amiss.
I tried to reset every switch on the panel hoping something good would happen.(ya know like lights?)
I then went around unplugging everything and feeling the wall (warm or hot spot)to see if something was shorting out near a plugin. In my backroom/computer room/tank room I have many, many things plugged in. I thought that it had to be something back there.
About 5:45 I starting calling electricians in the phone book. I found one that would make an emergency visit on a Saturday evening. ($150 service call).
When he showed up a 1/2 hour later, I told him I thought the problem was in the breaker box or the backroom.
He looked at the side of the house that was dark for a few seconds and walked straight over to a wall plugin (had nothing plugged in to it) and pushed a circuit tester in and said the problem was right here. At that moment the TV flickered and a few sparks shot out of the wall plugin.
The electrician then replaced the plugin and told me to get the rest of the plugins and switches in the house replaced. SOON.
The company that made the plugins and switches in my house was one of the biggest, Leviton. But what the electrician told me for about 15 years they made some very crappy ones that were used by many many contractors up untill the mid 80's.
The wall plugin that he removed from the wall was pretty much crispy. All the wires had the insulation burned off and all the wires going to it were burned up. This was a major fire just maybe minutes, hours, or days away, but it was going to happen. Looking at it just scared the crap out of me.
This plugin wasn't one of the ones I have mulitple pumps, lights, extention cords coming out of it was just a unused one by the outside door.
Maybe some of you that have houses built in the 70's and 80's might want to checkout something like this. I never dreamed that my house that was built in 81 would be like this.
__________________
I don't know if anyone has experienced this before, but yesterday evening about about 5:30 half my house suddenly lost power. It was the side that doesn't have my reef tank on it.
I went to the breaker box and looked for a popped breaker. Nothing was amiss.
I tried to reset every switch on the panel hoping something good would happen.(ya know like lights?)
I then went around unplugging everything and feeling the wall (warm or hot spot)to see if something was shorting out near a plugin. In my backroom/computer room/tank room I have many, many things plugged in. I thought that it had to be something back there.
About 5:45 I starting calling electricians in the phone book. I found one that would make an emergency visit on a Saturday evening. ($150 service call).
When he showed up a 1/2 hour later, I told him I thought the problem was in the breaker box or the backroom.
He looked at the side of the house that was dark for a few seconds and walked straight over to a wall plugin (had nothing plugged in to it) and pushed a circuit tester in and said the problem was right here. At that moment the TV flickered and a few sparks shot out of the wall plugin.
The electrician then replaced the plugin and told me to get the rest of the plugins and switches in the house replaced. SOON.
The company that made the plugins and switches in my house was one of the biggest, Leviton. But what the electrician told me for about 15 years they made some very crappy ones that were used by many many contractors up untill the mid 80's.
The wall plugin that he removed from the wall was pretty much crispy. All the wires had the insulation burned off and all the wires going to it were burned up. This was a major fire just maybe minutes, hours, or days away, but it was going to happen. Looking at it just scared the crap out of me.
This plugin wasn't one of the ones I have mulitple pumps, lights, extention cords coming out of it was just a unused one by the outside door.
Maybe some of you that have houses built in the 70's and 80's might want to checkout something like this. I never dreamed that my house that was built in 81 would be like this.
__________________
