Electrical Failure?

[Tom W Armstrong]

Hi All,

My wife has been "smelling something burning" in the kitchen for a few weeks. Then yesterday, circuit blew that has our coffee maker and toaster oven on it. The wife said she had both of them running at the same time and so I just reset the breaker and off we went.

However, this morning she found an outlet (away from the kitchen but on the same circuit) all burnt. See pictures. What would cause this? The house was built in 1997 so electrical is pretty up to date, etc.

Thanks,

[Rod Sheridan]

Loose connection is most likely.

Loose connections have high resistance and they heat up when current flows through them.

The other option is a poor receptacle...........It certainly didn't look like a high quality one in the photographs.

I'm still a big believer in the Hubbell 5262 receptacle, worth every penny...Regards, Rod.

[Thomas Bank]

x2

It looks like the attachment screws are backed out, but I've seen a lot of contractor grade receptacles have problems where the push-in attachments in the back have resulted in loose connections.

I highly recommend the extra couple bucks for high quality receptacles and using the screw attachments rather than the push-in attachments for just this reason.

[Dan Hintz]

Arcing... no doubt about it on that one.

[Tom W Armstrong]

Thanks all, so you're saying the screws were loose and the arcing created heat and that melted it? It wasn't a short just that the wire pulled away from the contact and so it would arc most of the time? I guess that makes sense. As current was pulled through the other kitchen receptacles it had to first pass through this outlet. Okay, I think I got it now.

[Bill Brady]

It is best to loop the wires around the screws and the new standard is to pig tail each receptacle and use wirenuts to make the connection. This connection will limit the amount of current on individual receptacles. I have seen this where a plug is pulled in and out of a receptacle that used the push in connection.

[Dan Friedrichs]

This is why they're called "Plug and PRAY" connectors.

I understand electricians are in a hurry...but it takes, what, 10 seconds to grab a pliers, make a loop with the wire, and tighten down the screw?

[Ken Fitzgerald]

As 6 year old our farm house burned down due to a gas leak. I don't do gas. Period. I hire the pros.

Electrical. While in the Navy and stationed at NAS Meridian, MS. we lived in a trailer park for 2 years until we got into base housing. The last trailer we lived in had aluminum wires and too often late at night with little light, I would see sparks on the electrical outlets.

Our young family was expanding and a couple of months after getting into base housing our youngest son was born.

About the same time as our family addition, that trailer burned to the ground. Cause? electrical.

I do electrical. I never cut corners, always buy the best quality components I can afford, always go to at least current code and ALWAYS get it inspected.

[Thomas Hotchkin]

Don't use the outlet as your connection point or pigtail other outlets from it. Join incoming and out going wires of same colors together at each box with a short 8" long wire pigtails and wire nuts to supply other outlet. Lots of Fires started from over loaded outlets with "pushed in wiring". connection point is under sized for the total current draw used in today's kitchen circuits. Tom

[Chris Damm]

You can use the 39 cent specials or spend the $2+ for a quality outlet. If you were building a house to make a profit which would you use? I have changed every outlet in my house and most of the lamp sockets too.

[Tom Jones III]

Why didn't the circuit breaker blow before the socket melted so bad? Cheap outlet or not I would have expected the circuit breaker to protect against something like that.

Don't assume your house is up to code just because it is relatively new. My house is just a few years older than yours and my neighborhood is talking about a class action lawsuit against the builder because the wiring in our houses are a joke. There is no possible way my house or several others could ever have passed inspection.

[Ronald Blue]

One question in my mind is whether the outlet was being used as a power beyond installation? If so then the possibility of a loose wire arcing is much more significant. Were the wires attached by screws or in the push in connector on the back? I am a firm believer in using only screw attachment method.

[Bruce King]

On houses that have two separate circuits for kitchen counter outlets it's a good idea to figure out which ones are on each circuit and avoid plugging in two high current items on that circuit. Most electricians alternate the receptacles but it could be setup any other way.

Bathrooms can be a problem too since they loop one circuit through all baths on many houses. Some older homes have the garage, exterior and bathrooms all on one circuit. This leaves lots of locations where something could be loose.

[Thomas Bank]

Why didn't the circuit breaker blow before the socket melted so bad?

Actually, issues like this is why the new regulations for arc-fault receptacles have shown up in recent years. Since it isn't arcing to ground or neutral, the breaker isn't going to do anything in this situation.

[David Cefai]

Tom Jones said:

Why didn't the circuit breaker blow before the socket melted so bad?

The circuit breaker will trip on high current. If the connection was loose or corroded it would actually reduce the current due to a higher resistance while, at the same time, heating up.