Is this caused by a bad breaker or something else?

[mmhouse]

I'm visiting my sister in her 1930's house which has been remodeled and added onto numerous times. The electrical is mostly very old and a mess. There is one area of the house where the power has begun to blink on and off without tripping the breaker (the affected area is on a single breaker as far as we can tell). The really odd part is that when the breaker is turned off there is still some minimal power to the circuit. I know this primarily because digital clocks on the circuit continue to work at least partially and under certain circumstances regular light bulbs will also dimly glow.

My question is this - can a bad breaker allow current through when turned off or is this current likely 'leaking' from somewhere else? If elsewhere, how would that happen?

By the way, the breaker box is in the garage.

 

[Jbullfrog]

I looked at a buddy's house where a 3-way switch that operated 2 lights actually had the lights fed from seperate circuits. You can drop thousands of dollars with an electrician chasing it, or spend the money and rewire it to know it is safe.

 

[Aceman]

Call an electrician.

You can drop thousands of dollars with an electrician chasing it, or spend the money and rewire it to know it is safe.

To charge a customer "thousands" of dollars for a fix I'd have to be there for a few days fixing the problem, not hours. Days.

I'd think almost any electrician could find the problem in a few hours...

I've never had one that took longer than a day, most are less than a couple hours.

 

[mmhouse]

We will be getting an electrician to look at it unless a bad breaker could cause this and then I'd just go ahead and replace the breaker myself. I suspect that an electrician could put in a lot of time on this one since the entire system seems to be jury rigged.

I'm also just curious as to possible causes so I'm a little more informed when talking to the electrician.

 

[Adrien]

To actually answer your question, yes a breaker can fail and allow current to pass through it--even if it's in the 'off' position.

Adrien

 

[Terry454]

To actually answer your question, yes a breaker can fail and allow current to pass through it--even if it's in the 'off' position.

Adrien

Which is why a fuse is better than a circuit breaker, but that invites a whole other off topic discussion.

Terry

 

[mmhouse]

To actually answer your question, yes a breaker can fail and allow current to pass through it--even if it's in the 'off' position.

Adrien

Thanks for the info. We'll try changing the breaker first. Now comes the fun part of finding the right breaker (Zinsco box). Hopefully there were a lot of them put in around here and the local supply house stocks the breakers.

 

[Adrien]

Thanks for the info. We'll try changing the breaker first. Now comes the fun part of finding the right breaker (Zinsco box). Hopefully there were a lot of them put in around here and the local supply house stocks the breakers.

Considering the price of a Zinsco breaker you might try using one of the breakers you already have to see if that's actually the problem or not.

Adrien

 

[Dave Maxwell]

Since were on the topic. What about lights that flicker fast and lightly. Only notice if not looking directly at them. See it in there glow

 

[BADSIX]

get rid of that zinsco breaker panel, it will burn your house down. most have alum bus bars they get corroded and loose contact then the bar will burn. the breakers are a problem allso. there pure junk, in oregon you would be lucky to get a home loan or insurance if they find a zinsco panel in the house.

 

[ishiboo]

Considering the price of a Zinsco breaker you might try using one of the breakers you already have to see if that's actually the problem or not.

Adrien

Since he's concerned about whether or not the breaker is leaking current, why doesn't he just unplug the breaker from the box? 2 seconds and the answer is there. You don't even have to disconnect the wire from it to test, though that would only add another second to the process

 

[mmhouse]

As it turns out there are multiple problems. The one breaker which happened to sit directly under the main likely had internal problems but the main breaker is also arcing on the bus bar when put under high load (i.e. stove burners turned on).

We're looking into replacement of the panel as suggested. Thanks for the feedback (no pun intended).

Edit: Update. Panel being replaced and upgraded to 200 amp service within the next day or two. Thanks for the comments and warning about the old Zinsco equipment.

 

[JasonTX]

Not related to the OP's house but for those not in the know, the other brand of panels to stay away from is Federal Pacific.