Clean AC power

Hey Guys - I live in miami so power surges are common as well as momentary cuts in power…sometimes power cuts last 15-60 seconds…

….so here’s what I’m thinking… 

Wall outlet to commercial grade Amazon sign-wave battery back-up. The meter on the backup tells me I’m never exceeding more than 20% of the units capacity. It’s already kicked in 3-4 times when the power “blinks” during storms. 

Then AQ Niagra 5000 into the battery back-up and then my components into the 5000…(waiting on the 5000 to arrive)

I’ll let you know what I hear.

My gear is all pretty new so as far as I can tell, it all sounds pretty quiet now.

jea48: Who would have thought that cleaning a circuit breaker's contacts would be so dangerous? Should I move my family to a hotel until the problem can be fixed?

Anyone remember that scene from Fight Club where Ed Norton's character goes down into the basement and wades in waist deep water to replace an old style screw in fuse that's sparking all over the place?

All the best,
Nonoise

vgizzi OP9 posts

07-06-2021
11:03am

jea48: Who would have thought that cleaning a circuit breaker’s contacts would be so dangerous? Should I move my family to a hotel until the problem can be fixed?

Should I move my family to a hotel until the problem can be fixed?

LOL, No.... Just don’t try to overload a 15 or 20 amp circuit to see if the breaker will trip open. It may or it may not trip open.
House was built in 1992 and it is still standing.

When the electrician comes out to look at the panel he will pull out the breakers, (not all at once) and inspect the breaker bus connectors for arcing damage as well as the connector on the Line side of the breakers. He may also look for discoloration on the branch circuit breaker hot conductors insulation as well as the branch circuit neutral wire insulation for discoloration. (Two causes. Loose connection. Wire overloaded for an extended time for possibly months or years).

If by chance in the winter months you use a portable electric space heater I would suggest you have the electrician pull the wall duplex receptacle(s) out of the wall box where the heater was plugged in and inspect the wire connections on the outlet. If the circuit was overloaded for hours upon hours over time the wire at the terminals will be discolored. Insulation on the wires near the terminations will be discolored, maybe brittle and or cracked. If the duplex outlets were used for in and out connections for the branch circuit wiring then all duplex outlets upstream toward the electrical panel on the circuit should be checked for damage.
15 amp branch circuits, 14awg wire, are the most abused, overloaded, by things like portable space heaters and such.


It may have been a blessing you cleaned the terminations on the load side of the breaker and posted it here on your thread.
You can thank @ 4krowme for peaking my interest and asking you who the manufacturer of the panel is/was.

I am not familiar with Challenger electrical panels. I have never seen one around here. I am quite familiar with FPE (commonly called F****ing Poor Equipment), and Zinsco (GTE-Sylvania). Both were sued out of existence.

Some of their breakers might trip open. Others were/are nothing more than ON/OFF disconnect switches.