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Gunner Asch[_6_] Gunner Asch[_6_] is offline
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Default 3 phase electrical receptacle on fire, explosions

On Sun, 02 Oct 2011 13:37:04 -0500, Ignoramus23561
wrote:

I had a little bit of a new experience today.

My new place has cables dropped from the ceiling, with receptacles
hanging somewhat above my height.

I was moving a crane and bumped into one of them, nothing big, just a
minor bump. Then I saw that the receptacle was on fire (or rather,
flames were coming out from inside), with small explosions inside.

I ran to the electrical control panel and turned off electricity to
the whole building. The fire stopped.

After a short while, I opened up the receptacle. It turned out that it
was full of grinding dust (! -- how did it get inside) -- and,
apparently, the dust shifted and shorted the contacts. It was a short
circuit, but with a lot of resistance from the dust, so it caught
fire, but did not trip a breaker.

I cut it off and taped the individual wires, but I am now thinking
that I need to take all of those things apart and blow them out with
compressed air.

Comments?

i


Yes.

Gunner

"In the history of mankind, there have always been men and women who's goal
in life is to take down nations. We have just elected such a man to run our
country." - David Lloyyd (2008)