Dead recepticles

[sueandmark03]

Howdy,

I am having an issue in my kitchen with three outlets. LEt me try to describe it the best I can. Plugged a mixer into a wall recepticle and immediately lost power to 4 total recepticles. My kitchen is "U" shaped.

If I was standing in my kitchen facing my sink, I have an outlet 1 foot to the right(not working) with a garbage disposal switch(working).

If I turned 90 degrees from the sink to the right I am looking at my stove with a GFI outlet 1 foot to the left(working) and a regular outlet to the right(working).

if I turned back to the sink, I also have an outlet, 1 foot away, to the left of the sink (not working) with a light switch in same(working) and another recepticle 3 feet from the sink over the counter(not working).

If I turned 90 degrees to the left I am facing a counter/breakfast bar and dishwasher(working) with a receptical on the end of the counter 3 feet to the left(not working).

There is another recepticle on the other side of the counter which is working. All of the GFIs I have found in the house are reset, al of the light switches and outlets are working. Breakers are not tripped and no smoke from the walls(but is that a possibility?)

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

[HayZee518]

see if any of the outlets feed off a gfci breaker. if there are no gfci breakers then one ground fault has tripped and is feeding downstream of it. trip each gfci and reset them. sometimes the button pops but doesn't come out all the way.

[sueandmark03]

Checked all the GFI outlets, tripped and reset with no luck. If this strin of outlets are fed by a GFI, could the GFI be bad or the wires leading from the GFI be bad?
I am probably going to call on an electrician this week. My house was built in 2000 and I think there should be more GFI outlets around....

Thanks for your reply.

[manhattan42]

Your kitchen is required by code to be wired with at least 2 small aplliance circuits.

These serve (in part) the receptacles on your counters.

These circuits are wired such that if one breaker trips, some, but not all of the GFCI receptacles on the counter will not work.

You probably need to open your panel and look for the circuits labeled 'kitchen' and reset one breaker by first pushing it all the way to the 'off' position, then all the way to 'on'...and your problem should end.

[sueandmark03]

Thanks for the input guys. Before I submitted this question I replaced the recepticle, wire for wire, that I thought had blown or gone bad. I also located all of the GFIs in my house, resetted each and turned off/on the breakers for the kitchen recepticles. Along the same wall I have ceiling light/dimmer switches, disposal switches, beneath cabinet lighting, my stove, dishwasher, microwave...all of which work just fine.

Hopefull this will not be a pain in the ass or costly for a electrician to chase down.

[HayZee518]

ok, judging from what I have read, the disposal is on a dedicated circuit and doesn't need a gfci, same with the dishwasher, no gfci as it is wired directly. same goes for the lights, no gfi required. in the year your house was wired, back stabbing receptacles was common as was pigtail connected outlets. I'm afraid you are going to need to remove all the outlets to the point you can see the wiring in back of them and see if a wire has pulled out of the back of one outlet. an open neutral in the chain will cause a problem as the hot can also create. the back stabbed outlet holds the wire by just a spring clip inside the outlet. OR I have seen wires that seem connected under a wirenut but the conductor is broken inside the wirenut and the wirenut is just holding onto the wire's insulation.

[pushkins]

Buy yourself one of the little electrical testers at Lowe's/HD (they beep when in contact with power) undo the screws holding the outlets (not working) and pull them out a little, turn the tester on and touch it to the black wires on the back of the outlets at some point one of them must be alive (you already checked for other GFCI's and the breaker) so power must be coming in at some point and not on feeding other outlets. Make sure you don't touch the tester to the switches that you said are still working (disposal etc...) that will give you a false reading.

[HayZee518]

Dan, I'm not to reliant on those inductive testers. they can false read even on a neutral! a neon tester or a "wiggy" would be my choice.

[pushkins]

Yep, your right I don't hang my life on them. It was just a thought for an inexpensive test to find a starting point.

[sueandmark03]

Thanks for the suggestions. I will test the outlets later for both disconnections and power.