I was trying to use the self cleaning cycle on my electric oven last night. I followed the instructions, but when I turned the knobs to the cleaning cycle I heard a pop. I noticed the cleaning cycle light didn’t turn on. I then tried a burner and I had no power. I went down the basement and saw that the circuit had been tripped. I reset the circuit and tried the cleaning cycle again. Same thing happened. I then went down the basement to reset the circuit and forget about cleaning my oven, but now the circuit won’t turn back on. I’ve tried it several times. Any ideas on what could cause this and how to fix it?
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Replies
Most likely, something is messed up in the oven self-cleaning circuit, either a short circuit or a ground fault. It caused the breaker to trip.
The breaker won't re-set because it's now broken.
A breaker takes a real hard hit when it trips under a short or fault; sometimes after a couple of such trips, the contacts or some other internal mechanism can be damaged. A breaker is designed to fail "safe", that is, if it dies, it dies in the off position.
A regular residential circuit breaker is a pretty inexpensive, mass-produced item, but it's a relatively complex electromechanical device. Depending on the manufacturer and how it was designed, and other factors, a breaker can get "used up" if it does its duty a few times.
This doen't mean that every breaker is going to fail after a couple of trips; I've seen breakers trip a dozen times and still work fine. It depends on the brand of breaker, it's age, and the conditions it's been subjected to. For instance, an old breaker in a damp, dusty environment probably is going to fail sooner than one in a dry, clean place, if it's subject to a few trips.
Lesson: if a breaker trips, don't re-set it unless you know why it tripped and have addressed the cause. This may be as simple as realizing there was an overload (as in, you plugged a new space heater into a circuit and shortly after firing up the space heater, the breaker tripped). If the breaker tripped and there was nothing new on the circuit, it's time to call in an electrician to troubleshoot and repair the problem.
What now? First, call an electrician to replace the breaker. Take note of the info from the breaker panel label (make and model number) and the amperage of the breaker, and give it to the sparky when you book the visit.
Don't even think of replacing ithe breaker yourself. A breaker panel is a very dangerous place; some have live exposed parts even is the main breaker is off.
Then call an applicance repair person to fix the oven.
Expensive lesson, eh?
Cliff
Edited 2/12/2008 12:21 pm ET by CAP
Mom quit using her self cleaning feature after it broke twice. Dad fixed it, he's an electrician. I can't remember what brand it is, if you're interested I can ask him what was wrong.