My tenant emailed this problem with my rental property. Has anyone experienced a problem like this before? Does it sound like a problem with the circuit breakers?
"...I don’t know if there is an electrical problem or what, but we have had a lot of issues since we moved in. The problem with the refrigerator is that the ice maker inside is shorted out, and where the ground wire is on the frig; it is all black around it, like the electricity arched. The frig is fine though, other than that, I am just worried about a fire. Many of the wall sockets don’t work at all, and some are also “stretched out” where plugs wont stay in them…I have never seen that before. In the master bedroom, I plugged a lamp into one of the sockets and it flickered for about an hour, then popped and went out. I put in a new bulb and it doesn’t work, I think something shorted out the lamp and it is dead. Finally, our cordless phone worked the first week it was in, but now doesn’t work at all, it is completely dead. We did not have all these problems with the stuff before, so I think the wiring needs to be checked, and the outlets need replacing on some..."
I would get on the phone to find a electrician as fast as possible. From the description your tenant gave, I wouldn’t be surprised if the house burnth down. And since you were notified of the problem, you may be held liable for the damages to the tenants property. Hopefully you will get this fixed before anything really bad happens.
This doesn’t sound like a “circuit breaker Problem”, per se but more like an overload condition – something is pulling a large load and it’s overloading the circuit(s)…
I think Will2 is right – you need to get an electrician over to check it out.
By the sounds of this it must be an older home. My century home had similar issues when we first moved in. We have upgraded our wiring over time and replaced all of the outlets with grounded plugs.
You may have the old “knob and tube” style wiring, which is not immediately an issue, but, can become one. This type of wiring was not designed with all of the electrical appliances that we use today, in mind. In fact there is probably not a ground line.
You need to have a qualified electrician take a look before further problems occur.
You need to get an electrician to that property ASAP. This sounds more than a “circuit breaker” problem. Infact circuit breakers rarely, if ever, trip, and only trip on overloads and shorts. It may even be a problem with one of the 120V feeds, that could explain why half of the circuits don’t work. Get a certified electrician over there, not some goofy handyman, electrical problems like this should be left to the pros. Meet with the electrician on site, and he’ll walk you through his findings and give you recommendations, do them, electricity is no joke. Get a seccond opinion if you have to. This might be an expensive project, just grin and bare it, you would feel pretty bad if the place burnt down and killed your tenants and there kids.
If this system is as old as I think it is, it probably doesn’t have circuit breakers, it probably has screw-in fuses, possibly the older ‘buss’ cartridge fuses…
If all of thes things are happening, I would also suspect that several of the fuses have blown (that would cause the outlets to be completely dead).
mostly like there is no grounding since that only came into code in late 60’s or early 70’s(I don’t remeber exact date). Many times people later do work and add grounds to individual outlets, but end up creating “floating” grounds which are not real grounds at all unless they are connected all the way back to the service panel.
my guess is the neutral side wiring of the house in the panel has issues(i.e. where all the white wires connect in the panel). Thus you are not making complete circuits and the electricity is looking for a path to ground/neutral by random means through other outlets, some partially connected grounds, etc.
Hard to say how much it will cost, but this is a very danagerous situation and need attention ASAP. A new service panel will start at out $1500 fully installed. Some lower cost fixs may also be possible, but just follow the advice of a licensed electrician (which I am not)