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Garage Electrical Circuit HELP NEEDED

Melensdad

Melensdad

Jerk in a Hawaiian Shirt & SNOWCAT Moderator
Staff member
About 2 weeks ago we had a storm roll through the area and it caused some problems with my electronic door locks and my alarm system at the house and at my garage. I thought I found all the problems . . . but today I found my compressor and my air conditioner in my garage are not working. The compressor turned out to be working, it was the electrical circuit that was not working. So I tested some other things and found that my garage air conditioner also was not working. The fuse box didn't have any tripped fuses. I flipped the breakers anyway, visually they were fine, they also responded normally when I flipped the switches, but there was still no power.

One thing I will not do is go into a breaker box to add circuits, but I'm sort of out of my league on this one. Could the breakers be bad? It is possible that the storm that screwed up some of my 12-volt appliances have also screwed up a couple of circuit breakers but not screwed up other circuits?

Suggestions?
 
Are the compressor and a/c on the same breaker?

You may have a problem in the outlets feeding them or an outlet in the wiring between the circuit breaker and the outlets that don't work. I've seen lightening damage to outlets where the electrician used the push in connections instead of the screw. the electrical contact is spring loaded and a strike sometimes will make the spring lose tension breaking the circuit. A big strike will burn wires off the outlet even if the screws were used.

Are they both 220v? You may have lost one of the 110v legs. Did you turn the main breaker off and on?

Jim
 
I would test both sides of the panel breakers . Too make sure that you have power in and power out of the breakers . If that is ok ,then I would look at and check the plugs unless you are direct wired into your AC & Compreesor . Does the Compressor and AC have their own Trip switch ???? Maybe they are manual reset .

I just remembered Bob, that this is a very new shop you have . Are the units on a GFI Circuit as someone else has mentioned ? Here in Calif. it is now required . Do you have a bathroom in the shop ? Maybe the Bathroom GFI is tied through to the garage/shop plugs . IF you do ,check to see if it is tripped . Lighting can do MAJOR damage .
 
Bob,
I don't remember what type of AC you put in the garage, but does it have it's own disconnect in the line?
 
The AC is a "Split Unit" type, it has its own circuit. I honestly didn't go outside to check the exterior of the unit, I'm not sure if there is a disconnect out there but there probably is, that will be something for me to look into.

The air compressor is a 110 unit, it is plugged into a circuit that has 3 duplex receptacles, one of which is a GFI unit, everything looks correct. A cordless phone base station is plugged into the GFI receptacle that is on the same circuit as the compressor and the phone is also dead. The GFI seems to be correct.
 
Sounds to me like the GFI has gone bad and I would also check to see if the AC disconnect has blown a fuse or tripped the breaker .That should be a 220 volt unit .
 
Al is probably correct and even if it is not your current problem it may be damaged and won"t trip. GFCI's don't like large surges.

Fluke makes a handy tester that doesn't require connection to the wiring, just put it beside the wire or put the end in the small side of the outlet. If the circuit is live the end of the tester lights up and it buzzes.

Greenlee has something similar but it only lights up and doesn't buzz.

Either should be available at the big box stores or an electrical supply place. Be sure you get the model for high voltage, 90 VAC and up. The one you want comes with a flat tip that will insert in the outlet. There's a round tip model for industrial applications.

Jim
 
Thanks, now I have some things to look for to hunt down the problems!
 
You might want to take the cover off the breaker box and check for burned wires or arc marks, especially around the white wires and the neutral buss.

Jim
 
jim slagle said:
The one you want comes with a flat tip that will insert in the outlet.

Jim
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what brand it is, but mine has a flat tip that looks like it is intended to insert into the outlet. I did that trying it out and pulled the tip out of the tool. It nearly needs to be near the outlet to work.

There are whole house surge protectors that are supposed to reduce the probability of lightning damage. Mine cost a couple hundred dollars. I think it was worth the peace of mind. I installed it after a lightning strike took out the surge protection on the phone connection in the UPS (uninterruptible power supply) for my computer.
 
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