Circuit to circuit influence
#1
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Circuit to circuit influence
I have an electric furnace (1977 Bryant Heat Pump) on it's own 100 amp circuit (referenced by circuit #1). When I walked in my house this morning, I heard a buzzing noise (similar to that of a washer being off balance but not as loud). I found that it was my furnace making the noise. The odd part is that while the sound was generated, circuit #15 (15 amp) did not work at all. No recepticles or fixtures would work until the sound finally stopped. My question is- has anyone heard of one circuit affecting another? I noticed one more instance about 30 minutes later in which the furnace kicked on and circuit #15 was affected(this time no buzzing was present). About 10 minutes later, I purposely raised the heat so the furnace turned on but it did not affect circuit #15.
#2
Loose or open neutral connections can cause one circuit to affect another. But if the service neutral is open, you usually have a lot of strange problems in your house (e.g., lights come on when you use the oven). Your situation does not exactly match this root cause, however, so you might have just had some coincidence. In any event, circuit #15 should be investigated for failing connections.
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Thanks for the replies. I'll investigate circuit #15 for sure. joed, would you mind explaining further your thoughts on this situation? Please excuse my ignorance, but I'm not sure what you meant by 'hot legs' and 'backfeeding'. Thanks