How to Reset a Breaker

Most people will call an electrician when something is suddenly not working at their house.  Just last week we had a service call where there was no power to some receptacles in the kitchen.  All I did was reset a breaker.  I’m going to give you a couple of quick things that you can do to save yourself time and money.  

The first mistake some homeowners make is not fully resetting a tripped breaker in their panel.  If a breaker somehow gets tripped, it can’t just be pushed back over to the on position in the panel box.  When you find a breaker that isn’t all the way over to the right, you have to flip it to the left to turn it completely off.  You will hear it click and then you know that it is ready to be pushed to the right.  This is how you fully reset the breaker to make it work properly.  If you don’t do it this way, things will still not work correctly.

After you have turned it to the off position completely, turn it back to the on position.

In some cases you will not see a breaker tripped at all.  This is most common in older electrical panels. This one is a little trickier and what I would call a "$50 dollar tip."  At this point all the breakers are to the right so gently slide your finger along the breakers almost like you are going to turn it off but not doing so.  In some cases you will find one that is kind of flimsy and then you have found the culprit.  Reset it and you’re on your way.  If it doesn’t reset and it flips back into the off position you have a bigger issue going on with the circuit.  That is when you call Wireworks Electric!  Hope this helps some of you out.

 -Rob Reiner