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wrote:
I live in a 1960's condo in Souther California. Some of the circuit
breakers have been buzzing since I moved in a few months ago. One in
particular would lose power until it was manipulated into the right
position on the breaker box (some of the breakers are very loose). A
few days ago, the most problematic breaker stopped working, killed the
fridge, and I have not been able to get power back to this side of the
condo since.

The breaker of interest is a double 20amp 2-pole Type Q Zinsco R38.
There does not to appear to be a main breaker that powers down
everything in this box. Am I running any great risk by taking this
breaker out while with the wires still hooked up to it (or even
disconnecting the wires with the breaker switched off)? I am willing
to face anything but death; I'm young and healthy, and I fix cars and
computers and do some home repair (just fyi). My idea is to replace
the breaker with another, less critical, breaker from the box just (i
don't need all of the wall receptacles to have power).

I will appreciate any thoughts on this issue.

Thank you.

It is relatively safe to work on a breaker with the breaker off.

I would switch off all breakers, remove the wires from the breakers
involved , swap out the breaker thats faulty and then reconnect the
wires.

The bus that feeds power to the breakers is not exposed with all
breaker positions filled.

However, HOWEVER, it is much safer to cut power to the box . There is
probably a disconnect on the main distribution and meter panel.

As others have suggested you might do better to have the box replaced.

You are only talking about an hours work if it is a straight box swap.