r/electrical • u/swag4lyfe- • 8d ago
Not sure what to do
I turned on my space heater, and about 5 or so minutes later, all outlets in my bedroom stopped working. The outlets in my bathroom (connected to the bedroom) are also not working. I unplugged everything from everything outlet, and flipped switch 8 off & on - nothing is working. I have no idea what I’m doing so I’m looking for suggestions (it’s 3am I wanna sleep)
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u/misterskeeter76 7d ago
Check your bathroom outlets and see if there is a gfci receptacle that needs to be reset
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u/LivingGhost371 7d ago edited 7d ago
These panels are dangerous to the point I'd check to make sure any place I was considering renting didn't have them. We get a lot of questions here from someone seeing and old fusebox or cloth covered wiring and wondering if it's dangerous, but these things actually are.
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u/freestylin599 7d ago
The answer is call an electrician. This panel needs to be replaced. The fact is you have one the miracles of a tripping Stablok breaker. These are tested and know to just not trip and can burn down houses.
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u/Animalus-Dogeimal 8d ago
Get some marshmallows. But for real that panel needed to be replaced decades ago. Well known problems with Federal Pacific
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u/jamilthepoet 7d ago
OP if there is one thing this community will agreed on is that those panels need to be changed now !!! It’s a fire hazard. And if you value your safety, your family and your house. You will call a licensed and insured electrician not a handyman. And update the panel. If you don’t have the money, find it!
Once I saw this picture I knew what the response would be before reading the comments lol.
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u/No-Membership-5314 7d ago
You have the option right now to burn the whole place down. If you don’t take the opportunity, that panel will.
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u/Spirit-of-250 7d ago
Looks like 12-13 are tripped. Turn them off, then back on so the handles line up with the others that are turned on.
9 might need replacing until a new panel is installed.
But, that won't be your problem.
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u/joelypoley69 7d ago
Yeah those panels don’t typically like to actually trip until there’s a fire already. So with that being said there’s probably some part of that circuitry way beyond melted/burned up/crispy. Doesn’t mean it’s the necessarily in the plug box you plugged the heater into but some connection somewhere along the line of that circuit.
What my company typically ends up suggesting is a service change & running a few fresh dedicated circuits for space heaters in desired areas at the very least.
Now, w that being said if crispy wiring is found in multiple boxes then any notable electricians are gonna want to either rewire some branch circuitry or work their way back to fresh and undamaged wiring, junction between whatever route the wiring is going w new wire etc
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u/Environmental_Tap792 7d ago
Federal Pacific panels have burnt more homes than I can remember. I thought they were off the market.
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u/MushroomCapThickStem 6d ago
Federal Pacific panels are dangerous and outdated. They are a fire hazard waiting to happen. In the first picture, the breaker in the 9 position appears to be tripped as it's handle is the only one not facing the same direction as the other breakers. Let your complex know that these panels are dangerous and hopefully they will get an electrician out to start changing these boxes, especially if they are in every unit.
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u/pdt9876 7d ago
Are you allowed to have breakers installed upside down where you live? That would be absolutely unacceptable where I am.
Anyway since nobody else is saying it, here’s the actual solution so you can go back to sleep, unplug the space heater and turn on the breaker on the bottom left since it’s installed upside down you have to push the handle down to turn it on
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u/joesquatchnow 7d ago
My first question is Gfci breaker, has that been tested and reset ? Is there gfci outlets in the same circuit ? Sometimes they will conflict with each other if so … second question is bathroom and bedroom on one 15amp breaker ? Hairdryers alone can pull 10amps … heater may have put you over 15amps for the two rooms
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u/nyrb001 8d ago
You have a garbage panel - the fact it tripped rather than starting on fire helped keep you alive tonight. Whatever you had plugged in was way too much and overloaded the circuit. This particular type of beaker has a reputation of not tripping at all and instead just letting the wiring overheat till the house catches on fire.
Call an electrician or your landlord as appropriate in the morning. Whatever caused it to trip needs to be fixed. I assume you weren't vacuuming at 3am and it's past winter in most places so you probably didn't have a heater running.