Problem

flash

this might be a stupid ? but here it is. I got a customer whose house is have a wierd electrical problem. first it was the living room and 2 bedrooms that the power was out but only for about 4 hours give or take then it would come back on.so i change the breaker and it was fine. The the kitchen was doing it. so i did the same thing. now the living room and 2 beds are doing it again. If its not the breaker then what? this house has som crazy wiring too that i have never seen. it has one wire that comes off the breaker and supplies the liv,2 bed.thats not hte wierd thing. the one wire looks like it was striped back every were that it goes down to the wall instead of useing j boxs. I guess from what i am told is it is the old style.

firemike

Other than having a collection of bad wiring, it kinda sounds like a loose neutral somewhere that may be shared with both circuits. Many connection problems can be traced to the stab style of plugs/switches, where you just push a stripped wire in the little hole in the back of the device, you are relying on a tiny little pieces of sheet metal pushing against the wire inside the device to carry the load of the circuit. Many fail after time, causing flickering, dead circuits, "goofy problems", etc. Another cause may be wire connections using wire nuts without twisting the conductors together first.

If all your problems are happening with circuits on the same phase (same 120 volt side coming in to the house) , it might be a bad main breaker, a bad connection in the meter socket or at the mast head if the house has one.

It is hard to give any good troubleshooting advice without having more accurate information to work with.

CE1

I concur with firemike that more information is needed.

What kind of wiring method?
Romex (12/2 with ground) (14/4 with ground)
cambric cover (12/2 no ground) (14/2 no ground)
BX (spiral metal sheath with 12/2 no ground or 14/2 no ground)
knob & tube (individual wires ran on insulators and through ceramic tubes)
etc.

What type of a circuit breaker panel are you talking about?
new type circuit breakers, screw in plug fuses, etc.

We need more detailed information in order to help you out.

Turn Two

flash

its the knob and tube, and it is the new style of breakers

CE1

any romex?

flash

nope, this is a really old house. i have been doing this for about 5 yrs and even when i was in the military i never seen this wiring method.
ITS FREAKIN CRAZY i am thinking about talking the guy into redoing the whole house.

CE1

Sonds like rewiring the house is a good idea. If you can do it T & M thats the way to go. Rewiring an old house can be very time consuming and you never know what you are going to run into.

Carry On!

Attachment 1854 69 to 76

flash

the house is about 1000 sqft how much sould i carche for something like that?

Speedy Petey

I'll quote CE1 with my reply:

__________________

wavector

Are the hots going out or the neutral? Knob and tubing has shared neutrals. Two circuits on opposite phases will share a neutral. Check the neutral connections at the service, meter and main panel. Check all of the panel connections, sounds like a loose connection of a feeder.

flash

thaks for everything but it ended up being pg&e's problem they had a loose connection on the pole.

MSSI

as I am scrolling down ...I was thinking you are loosing a leg intermitantly...lo and behold...........I always start my troubleshooting from the very beginning. rather than at the symptom..It can sve a lot of agrivation. I had a guy I work with spend 4 hours last week trying to find a bad connection..turns out the breaker was bad. fairly rare but...Had he just started at he beginning of the maze instead of in the middle and worked his way out in 9 different directions.....Well you get the point.....