Erratic behaviour

[mcgoo77]

I have an outlet and lights in my kitchen that seem to be on the same circuit (or line) that from time to time stop working. They will work for awhile (a month or a couple of months) then all of a sudden stop working. Sometimes just the lights, sometimes just the outlet or sometimes both. Then after a couple of days one or the other, or both will start working again. It is very erratic and there is no set time in weeks or months that seems consistant for them to go off. I would like to find the reason but I'm more concerned about faulty wires and the possibility of a fire. Any suggestions?

[David]

I would have your same concerns. How old is your home? How long have you had this problem?

When something stops working, like a light. Take a tester to each outlet and see if they are functioning or not. The whole circuit from the failure point to the end should all be out. It'd be freaky to have two failure points. Perhaps you have a faulty outlet or faulty light fixture as the failure point. The best thing you can do is try to isolate it to one point.

Filp the breaker, then look at the wiring behind every outlet and every light fixture on that breaker. If the wiring looks good, perhaps you can test the outlets or just replace them all.

[giddonah]

I'm with David, I'd be concerned too. First, evaluate your ability to work with electrical stuff. If you feel comfortable taking your life into your own hands (it sounds drastic, but this is what you're doing), then get to it.

My first impression: Loose wire, somewhere in a box. While it's working, trip the breaker and find out exactly what's on that circuit. Map out where it goes physically from the panel. Most of it will be inside walls, but try to figure out where the wires run. When the outlets die, see if everything on the circuit dies, or just some of it. If it's some of it, check the last working box from the panel, and the first non-working box from the panel. It could be an outlet box, a junction box or in a lighting box. If Murphy has his way, it's not in any boxes, but it's somewhere inside a wall. If all the splices in the boxes look good, you'll need to get tougher (and the danger of a fire just went up exponentially). You'll need to trace the wires. This equipment isn't prohibitively expensive, but it's not worth a one-time use. You might as well call in an electrician to find the problem for you.

Make sure the problem doesn't coincide with ANYTHING else. You never know.

[CThomp]

You should see my house. I have whole sets of outlets and fans that don't work. Why? I have a loose hot wire between walls.

Scarey huh? We're moving out this weekend so I can gut the rest of the house in the coming weeks.

[mcgoo77]

Thanks for the info. I'm betting it's in the wall (or in this case the ceiling) as I had the box replaced and it worked for a while but has since come and gone again. It was a nuisance but I just let it be until it worked again. Now that you say it may be a fire hazard I guess I'll get an electrician over and have it looked at.

[giddonah]

If you had a box replaced recently, I'll put 2$ down on a loose wire nut in the box. You can check that yourself if you want. Cut the power, open the box, (this is where the non-contact voltage detector comes in handy to make sure there really isn't any power in there before you reach in), then make sure all the wires that are secured together really are secure. I tug on wires to see if I can pull them out of the wire nut. If I can, I take the nut off, re-twist them with a pair of linesman's pliers and put the nut back on real tight.

[David]

...I'll put 2$ down ...

You big risk taker! That's too deep for my pockets.:shock:

[mcgoo77]

giddonah; I had the box replaced when this problem first began and it fixed it for awhile but now it's back. So by the sounds of the possibilities in previous posts, it's either in the wall, ceiling or maybe (and hopefully) the light fixture as that would be the easiest to fnd and fix.