A friend has a mountain cabin that is a 7-hour drive away. As such he visits it infrequently. There is power to the cabin but said power gets interrupted at random times. When the power is restored, the circuit breaker supplying the kitchen, which includes the refrigerator, almost invariably trips. This results in anything that’s in the 'fridge spoiling before his next visit.
Because the refrigerator is in the kitchen, the outlets must be on a GFI/GFCI. This may or may not have a bearing on the issue but he feels that it’s the GFCI-equipped breaker causing his problems although changing it for a new one of the same model did not fix the issue. He’s asked me for advice because, well, I guess because he doesn’t know any better.
As I see it, his options are:
Run a dedicated line from the breaker panel to the 'fridge and isolate that from the rest of the kitchen appliances. He’s reluctant to do so because it’s an exterior (insulated) wall and the wiring would be difficult. And expensive.
IF the 'fridge is the first thing on the branch (wires run directly to it from the breaker box) he could replace the breaker in the panel with a regular one, break the circuit downstream of the refrigerator, and install a GFI outlet for the downstream outlets. This would require a fairly simple re-wire at the outlet box for the 'fridge but requires that the wiring in place be as described with EVERYTHING downstream so as to be on the GFI.
Something that I haven’t thought of, but suggested by you, that will still be in compliance with code.
Stop leaving anything perishable in the darn thing and unplug it when he’s not going to be there. This is what I suggested as the first and best way, but it wasn’t met with the expected cries of “Lare! You’re a genius! I’ll do that.” For his own reasons he wants to be able to leave it plugged in and was quite insistent that I “ask around” for other options–which I’ve done in #3, above.
So I turn it over to you, my SDMB brethren. Is there something I’ve missed such as special GFI/GFCI Refrigerator Circuit Breakers that are only available at Grainger’s? (Not listed that way on-line, but who knows?) Because of the long drive I’d like to have my troubleshooting/suggestions all in a row before I suggest we drive up there to apply the ultimate fix.
Are there other electrical devices left plugged in to that line? Can they be unplugged when he leaves? Any electrical device that powers up when plugged in can draw more current at startup than you might think, although for little things like an LED clock it’s still not much.
I don’t have a good answer, but I will just note that an electrician once told me that a refrigerator should NOT be on a GFCI outlet for exactly this reason. Sounds to me like #2 is the best option if the fridge really is the first outlet on the circuit.
I don’t (and he didn’t) have the answer to that question. Which was the first thing I asked. It’s on the list for After The Drive to check.
I thought it was dumb to have it wired the way it is, but it’s the way the house is wired so it’s what we have to work with.I agree with your electrician friend, markn_1.
A dedicated line to the fridge with a regular breaker is the best option. If you can’t use a dedicated line, even with a downstream GFCI breaker he should still mitigate the problem by unplugging any other devices that don’t have to be on when he is gone.
Cheap, simple, and appropriate for a facility that’ll be unused while the jerry-rig is in place.
Get an extension cord and bob’s your uncle. @bob_2 that is.
If the owner does use this method and he comes back 3 months later to find the ordinary breaker tripped, he’ll have reason to suspect the fridge itself is defective. So even if it doesn’t solve his problem, it’ll help him troubleshoot it.
Refrigerators are notoriously fussy on GFI circuits - and no one ever seems to want to figure out why, but rather says ‘don’t use it on a GFI because you have to rely on your fridge’. I and a few others suspect the defrost cycle with powered resistance heaters and flowing water… Since you can’t redesign your fridge, the aux-power-cord-when-away option seems the best bet for the OP.
Assuming we’re talking conventional 120v power in North America, a 14ga cord will do for 50 or shorter feet, but a 12ga is needed for longer than 50 feet.
@bob_2 is in the UK and would be better placed to answer if this cabin is there or some other country commonly using 220v power for ordinary outlets & appliances, unlike in North America.
Mea culpa. I should have specified that his cabin is in the U.S.
And I’m not jealous at all that he has a cabin in the mountains and I don’t. No. Not at all.
I could have looked at your location and deduced the cabin was in the US or Mexico, both of whom use 120v power. So I overlooked something too. D’oh.
I was mostly wanting to pre-empt bob offering a 220v answer that you might mistakenly assume was a 110v answer. That would be bad. While also giving him ongoing credit for it being his idea.
Note also I gave the wire gauges for a continuous load drawing the max amperage that the standard US outlet is good for. So that’s almost certainly overly conservative for the actual situation of a lesser draw running only intermittently. So you could safely enough down-gauge the cord by one size: 16ga for short and 14ga for long.
Then again, for an unattended cabin you’d probably rather overprovision the extension cord than come back to a charred hulk of a cabin that started a massive forest fire. Sometimes the extra $10 - $20 to do the job right in both size and quality is cheap insurance.
Replace the GFI breaker with a standard breaker. Then replace the kitchen outlets with a GFIC outlet. It may be necessary to only change out one outlet to a GFIC outlet if all the other outlets are down stream.
