Do we have an electrician in the house?

I was thinking bad leg as well, but more things would stop working than just a room or two. Anything using a 2-pole breaker wouldn't function properly either: electric stove, water heater, A/C, etc.

Be prepared for a pricey bill for what seems like a simple repair, essentially because the diagnosis can be time consuming. The electrician should have tools to trace the circuit to find the break in the wiring. Unlike a fault to ground, the breaker wouldn't necessarily trip if the wire simply breaks or comes loose.

I built my house 14 years ago and the breakers had been shuffled around inside the panel a bunch of times since then. After the frustration of chasing a mystery outage this winter, I finally spent an entire day checking and relabeling the whole system. I went all out, with cross referenced lists so that I can either search a circuit from the panel or from the outlet, and laminated maps of the house with the breaker for each outlet and circuit identified. I'm actually looking forward to my next electrical problem.

In reply to Woody:

I know what you mean. During the process of wiring the renovation/addition for the ex's house I did the same thing for all of the wiring. I still need to finish that project for my own house. Much of the wiring is original to the house and a lot of it has been kludged over the years. Part of my renovation plan is to rip out most of the wiring and redo it. Since much of the work is in actually getting to the wiring buried in walls, I see no point in leaving 60+ year old cloth-insulated wiring in there.

Woody wrote: I built my house 14 years ago and the breakers had been shuffled around inside the panel a bunch of times since then. After the frustration of chasing a mystery outage this winter, I finally spent an entire day checking and relabeling the whole system. I went all out, with cross referenced lists so that I can either search a circuit from the panel or from the outlet, and laminated maps of the house with the breaker for each outlet and circuit identified. I'm actually looking forward to my next electrical problem.

All you did was ensure that you will never have another electrical problem, ever.

But that sounds awesome. I may need to do this.

I talked to the electrician this morning and, yes, when they built our house they moved the headstones but not the bodies.

If I had to GUESS, I would GUESS a bad breaker or a bad connection at the first plug on that line, or a bad plug. They are a buck at Lowe's. Don't kill yourself. If you're not comfortable doing electrical work, hire someone that is.

Electrical circuits are like old carbs...you have to blow the carbon out of them occasionally. I would plug in as many things in your house as possible, space heaters and welders are especially good for this. Then really run up the juice for a while and blow out those lines. You'll notice that your lamps and TVs are brighter, computers run faster, and the microwave cooks in less time.

In reply to pinchvalve:

...but go too far and you let the smoke out. That is bad.

I'm staying with my original prediction of a tripped GFI somewhere.

In reply to Woody:

I think that would only make sense if the power hadn't come back on. Once it's tripped it's off. Unless someone in the house is going around resetting outlets without telling anyone.

mazdeuce wrote: In reply to Woody: I think that would only make sense if the power hadn't come back on. Once it's tripped it's off. Unless someone in the house is going around resetting outlets without telling anyone.

Agreed. A tripped ground fault outlet doesn't magically reset itself.

In reply to mazdeuce:

Whoops, forgot about that part...

Just to add............similar thing happened in my parent's house a few (many?) years ago. Apparently one of the wires between the transformer at the street and the house was nicked and it took a few years to corrode to the point where it suddenly became intermittent. The utility company repaired free of charge....just ran a new set of wires to the house.

Woody wrote: In reply to mazdeuce: Whoops, forgot about that part...

Yeah, the "coming back on and then going out" part is what has me confused, too. There aren't any GFI outlets on that circuit, either.

I realize it's just electricity, but I'd rather leave it to the experts. I have plans for this weekend and would like to be there for them.

David S. Wallens wrote: Yeah, the coming back on and then going out part is what has me confused, too.

Loose or corroded connections can do that - if there's just a light load (say a small table lamp) the circuit can appear to be working fine, but plug in something that draws a little more power and the whole thing goes dead.

Are the rooms with the power outage on a single breaker, or are they across multiple breakers?

Single. I think.

Ian F wrote: In reply to pinchvalve: ...but go too far and you let the smoke out. That is bad.

I have some Lucas smoke, but its only listed for use in Triumphs.

We're back on the grid, and now I know a little more about how houses are wired. I guess I assumed that each room/section of the house would be a separate zone. I also assumed that a functioning outlet wouldn't be part of the problem. Both assumptions were wrong.

The electrician stuck his tester in one of the bad outlets. Bad ground.

When I showed him which lights/outlets we used that day, he found the bad one on his first try. That outlet was still working, so I assumed that it wasn't part of the problem. Turns out it was the problem.

He said ours was the third situation like that he saw today. He also pigtailed the new outset so, in theory, it doesn't happen again.

Yay electricity.

Yeah! Now your house won't burn down! You can sleep easy tonight. Those electrical situations always make me nervous. Glad to hear it is taken care of.