Electrical Anomaly

[Matt Davis]

I know i should probably just call an electrician, but i wondered if this is a problem that may have an easy solution.

I randomly lose power in the north end of my 4 bedroom modular home. The master bedroom, bedroom #1 and both bathrooms lose all power. When this happens, i also lose just my refrigerator, and microwave (in the kitchen at the south end of the house), and my furnace (in the basement at the south end of the house) all other electrical devices in the south end of the house work fine when this happens.

When this happens, none of my circuit breakers trip off. And the really strange part is if i wait a little over an hour, all the power comes back on by itself.

This is really beginning to annoy me, because it is very cold up here in new england, and losing heat even for an hour is not good. It is also frustrating that i cant pinpoint where the problem is, because it is so widespread and random.

Any help or insight would be greatly appriciated.

[rmurray]

When you mention both baths (and probably the exterior outlets as well)..it sounds like the ground fault breaker....You might try changing it to see if this helps..They have a bad habit of going bad..

The going off and comming back impiles a heat build up problem..some breaker is over heating..goes back when it cools down..If so..it will not be long before it is totally shot..

If you are uncomfortable with electric..call an electrician soon...You should be able to tell which breaker is bad by feeling them for excessive heat when they first go off...Since such a large part of the home is off...be sure to check the main breaker...on side might be bad..Remember the main outside..

Good Luck

[mac]

I'm wondering if a crossover connection might be a bit loose. I have found, over time, that lots of my outdoor connections develop a bit of corrosion, and gradually lose contact. The fix is easy; just disconnect the offending connections, clean them, coat them with silicone grease (get a can at an auto parts store), then reconnect.
This is an old dirt-bike trick for riding in water.
Your crossovers might be easy to get at under the house. They are the place where one section is connected electrically to the next.

The GFIs go bad, as Mr. Murray notes - I bet between these two, you have the answer.

P.S. probably worth turning off the main breaker before pulling the crossover apart-

[Danny]

does any of your neighbors have similar problems? could be a bad transformer that heats up ..and then cools down.....have your power company check the outside lines first...if there is no problem there ....you could have a bad main breaker doing the heating and cooling.....it seems to be to wide spread to be the home...but it could be....also a microwave oven is supposed to be on an isolated curcit ....(alone)....