On Wed, 20 Jan 2016 06:35:36 -0600, Unquestionably Confused
wrote:

On 1/20/2016 4:45 AM, E. Robinson wrote:
On Wed, 20 Jan 2016 04:24:55 -0500, Dick Phallic wrote:

I'd start by disconnecting the load at the breaker and then see if the breaker still trips.

If the breaker is OK, then I'd start removing and disconnecting outlets and switches on the affected circuit until I found the problem.

You didn't recently nail/screw/install something on a wall, did you?

To "disconnect the load at the breaker", do you mean that I should just
physically *remove* the breaker, and see if it trips on its own, in
my hands?

To "disconnect outlets and switches", do you mean to pull them out of the
wall, one by one, disconnecting the hot wire only? (Would that be enough?)

No, I didn't recently install anything (that I know of).


In the situation you describe, I suspect that the easiest way to debug
is to replace the breaker. I'm told that sometimes they just crap out

I had a GFCI breaker fail when it was only about 5 years old. The
replacement is 31 years old and doing fine. Regular breakers are a
quite a bit cheaper than GFCI

on their own after years of use. Your time is worth something and the
breaker isn't that expensive. Buy a replacement and swap it out and see
what happens.

If he's going to do this he should turn off all the power to the
breaker box by flipping the main breaker at the top, and use a
flashlight to see. Or at the verrry least he should keep one hand in
his pocket, literally, so he can't touch things with two hands and get
killed, literally.

First turn off the breaker in question.

Then when the breaker is off, unscrew the screw that holds the wire at
the end of the breaker that's not in the middle of the box. Probably
don't have to unscrew it all the way. You don't want the screw
dropping into the box, and you don't want to be reflexively showing
your hand in the box when you see the screw about to fall. If it
does fall, just let it.

Grab the wire on that screw by its insulation and push, pull etc. it
off the screw.

Then lift the end of the breaker away from the center of the box up
and pull/rock the breaker out of the clip it's in at the center. It
should come out quickly.

Reverse to install. Except that it might be easier to hook the wire
on the screw BEFORE putting the breaker in at all. Maybe you can use
two hands for this part only.

You definitely DON"T want to remove the screw, if it even comes
out, because it will be hard to get it back in, but it probably comes
out enough that it's easy to hook the wire back on it.

Use the same size breaker, 15A, 20A, whatever was there. You can't
safely increase the size.