My neighbor asked me to help with an electrical problem. I placed my Greenlee non contact voltage detector near the outlet and it flashed. Then we plugged in a night light and it did not light. The testor showed a loss of power. We unplugged the night light and the tester showed the power restored. We did this several times.

I have never seen this before. At first I thought the breaker had tripped and that the nightlight was the problem. We then plugged in a small vacuumecleaner into the same outlet and the result was the same the appliance did not work and the power was lost to the outlet according to my detector. Unplugging the vacuumerestored the power to the outlet.

The circuit panel is an old Magnatrip box. I have never seen this before. I have replaced outlets and circuit breakers in my own home, but no way would I want to take this problem on.

Has anyone heard of this problem before?

Thanks,

Jim

Sounds a bit like a loose connection at the outlet. Did you pull the outlet and check them?

Thanks for the reply. The owner is going to do that. I am waiting for him to tell me the results. I am still searching the web for a possible answer, since this happened at three separate outlets.

There is some evidence that the Magnatrip box has a history of unreliability.

I will post with updates. I am really interested in this problem.

Thanks

Like SC says likely a connection. I would check one of the end of the 3 outlets, and the last good receptacle before the bad ones, could also be in a light or switch box.