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Electrical Wiring

Finding a GFI

9 years ago

We were doing some pressure washing of our house exterior and must have popped a GFI somewhere because the power to the outlet being used went dead and took a couple others with it. Locations - back corner bedroom, and 2 on the lanai/back porch. There are other that are still working on the lanai FWIW.

The thing is - we can't find the GFI for these anywhere. The house is larger (3900 sqft single story) All other power everywhere else is working. I've looked in the garage (far away), other porch outlets, kitchen, back corner bedroom, bathroom on that side of the house - (also looked in the main breaker panels) - I've just run out of places to look.

Without pulling the house plans from the city - how does one find this GFI? Is there any trick to track one down?

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Comments (7)

Ron Natalie
9 years ago
Look in places where GFCI's are required (unfinished basements, garages, outdoor receptacles). It also could be in the electrical panel itself, built into the circuit breaker.
karyn
Original Author
9 years ago
FOUND! Thanks. This had been making me crazy. I also discovered it took out 2 outlets in a secondary bathroom we never use.

Garage was the location - two GFIs in a double outlet hidden behind some stuff and one of them was the culprit. Kind of strange since it's very very far from the back of the house to this location, but finally figured it out.
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An ordinary receptacle like you find all over the house must be on a 15 or 20 amp breaker. Only large receptacles such as used for clothes dryers and other large loads can be on 30A breakers. A 20A breaker can supply #12 or larger wire (#10 is ok) and 15 amp breaker can supply #14 wire or larger wire. If this circuit is just for general use receptacles, change the breaker to a reasonable size and install a 15 or 20A GFCI receptacle. If it supplies some heavy load that needs the 30A breaker, then get the general use receptacles off that circuit and on a different breaker of suitable size.
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Did an electrician do that? Remove the white connecting to the GFCI. Remove the wire nut holding the white together and untwist the wires. Throw out the short piece of white wire. You will see the wires are bundled together in a set of black/white/green as the enter the box. Find the white wire that is bundled with the bottom black wire and connect it to the bottom screw on the side where the current white wire is. Connect the other white to the top screw. Assuming he had the live/black wires in the right slots to begin with, that should work. If not, move the top black/white to the bottom and the bottom black/white to the top. I can't tell from the picture if the upper set screw on the neutral side is missing. If so, you would just need a new screw.
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Have you tried resetting the GFCIs you can see. Sometimes these are hard to reset. Also seems you have a lot on this circuit especially if you have the garage, outdoor lights and bathroom GFCIs on the same circuit. Perhaps there is another GFCI in the garage behind something. Is it possible an outdoor receptacle has a GFCI that is wired in the same circuit?
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I suspect your guess that there's a GFCI somewhere that is tripped is valid. Especially in houses built in the early days of GFCI requirements, it wasn't uncommon to string many protected (outdoor, bathroom) receptacles off a single GFCI. Have you looked in all the bathrooms in the house? If there is a basement, have you looked at all the receptacles there? Did you look in the panel? Of course with dubious contractors they may have covered it up or put it in a less than readily accessible location, you'll have to hunt.
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dalepar
9 years ago
It can be amazing where the GFI can be located. There are two options that I like better. One is GFI breakers. We all know where the breaker box is. Where I live now is about six years old, and where required (kitchen, bath, balcony) every outlet is a GFCI. They have come down in price to where I guess they just install them where needed.

Dale
Ron Natalie
9 years ago
The big reason builders don't use GFCI breakers is they are more expensive than the receptacle type. You'll only find a lot of these goofy mystery circuit things in older houses. Newer codes bar the bathrooms, laundry rooms, and kitchens from sharing outlets with other places (garages, basements, outside).
dalepar
9 years ago
I just find it amazing the every bath and kitchen counter outlet is a GFCI. They now have outlets with a USB port built in. We wanted those on the island, but size wise they cannot make it a GFCI also. We would have to make it a circuit protection or gang two outlets at the location.

Our bedrooms have arc protection. What a pain as they can be pretty sensitive.

The only GFCI breaker we have it to the bathtub.
DaleP
Ron Natalie
9 years ago
You don't need a GFCI receptacle at each location on the countertop, they just all need to be PROTECTED by a GFCI. You can daisy chain them off an earlier receptacle in the circuit or use a GFCI breaker.

Depending on when your house was built, you might want to look into replacing the arcfaults with newer ones. The old GE mod 2 arcfaults in my house nuisance tripped a lot, but GE went to mod3 and that solved a lot of the problems.
dalepar
9 years ago
The one I wanted to add as a USB port was one of the early outlets in the circuit. Too close to the sink not to be a GFCI. I thought about cutting in for a double box, put one GFCI also protecting the USB outlet. Actually, kind of got over it. I am used to the USB adapter plugged in all the time.

I had heard that the newer arc protectors were less sensitive, but have not had a problem lately. They had put an arc protector to the den. Home office did not agree with the arc protector. Since it is a den and not a bedroom (no door, no closet), I just took out the arc protector and put in a normal breaker.

DaleP

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