Two computers, a TV and a lamp. Overloading the circuit?

Question

I have a basement apartment, in which two rooms on a single circuit contain two computers (one LCD monitor and one CRT monitor), a television, a few lamps and sometimes an XBox. Is it possible that I overloaded the circuit with that much power? The lamps were flickering weird and a day or two later, the power in the room simply went out (and overloaded my crappy surge protector and blew up my old computer.)

Is the wiring in here just crappy? My landlord says I have too much plugged in, but computers don't use THAT much power. Is he just lying so he doesn't have to hire an electrician? Should I really have to reset the breaker every week or so?

Answer 1

Well, the answer is you COULD be overloading the circuit. Is it a single breaker which supplies all of these things? In the breaker box where you reset the breaker, the breaker should have a number on it. Typically, it will be 15, for 15 amps, or maybe 20. My house has 15 amp circuits. It is a 3 bedroom, 2 bath with built-in garage, called a "split-level" home. Each bedroom has a single 15 amp breaker. 15 amps, loosely calculated means about 1500 watts of load is the max. A while back, I had a visitor living with me who plugged in a coffee pot in the bedroom, which drew 1500 watts all by itself. He also had a computer and a TV and then there are the lamps and overhead lighting. And, it tripped the breaker. (I have magnetic breakers instead of thermal so it immediately tripped on overload instead of taking some time for the thermal breaker to heat enough to trip.) So, add up what you have loading the circuit. You may very well have an overload situation. A typical CRT monitor draws 100-150 wats, same for most computers, so 2 computers and 2 monitors will draw about 400-600 watts give or take. I am estimating here. Add a couple 100 watt light bulbs, add another 150-200 watts for the tv and you can see the watts add up quickly. The breaker is there to protect the wiring from an overload situation. The higher the current, the more self heating in the wires due to internal resistence of the wire, hence the 15 amp circuit breaker rather than some other value. Enough current and the wire gets hot enough to melt insulation and possibly cause a fire. So, the breaker trips before that self heating can cause any damage in the event an item develops a fault and draws large amounts of current.

The symptoms you describe with lights flickering and the surge which fried your computer are not consistent with an overload, but rather something else, like a corroded connection somewhere which presents a resistence at the joined connection of two wires in a box or outlet, The heating which happens in the corrosion can cause the flickering as it alternately makes and breaks the circuit, like rapidly flicking a switch, but much faster than you could do by hand. The surge can come from the rapid application of power after the corrosion causes the voltage to drop, followed by the power arcing through the corrosion which brings the power back to full voltage. Just a possibility. The alternative for the surge could be something like a lightning strike to power lines nearby. The surge bothers me. Nothing in the overload or corrosion situations accounts for the surge which took out your computer in spite of your surge protectors. A lightning strike on my street took out 3 VCR's, 2 TV's and 3 computers in my house and tripped almost all of the breakers in my box and I've got high quality surge protection on everything since lightning where I live is a frequent hazard.

Answer 2

Do you have a refrigerator, air conditioner or any other appliances?
Have you hung a picture lately and perhaps put a nail through an electrical cable?

You can figure out easily the power that you are consuming. Each of your devices will consume a certain wattage. Add up everything you have plugged in and any devises that are hard wired (wall switch for a ceiling light for example)
Simply divide the total wattage by 120.
Simply put, 120 watts consumes approximately 1 Amp.

My answer, based on what you indicated you have in your rooms (and the weird flickering lamps) would be to have an electrician check the wiring and other circuits - outlets, switches, and so on for a possible problem) One of your appliances you have plugged in may be faulty also.

Note: If you have to keep resetting the breaker, there is a problem that should be checked out and remedied as soon as possible.

Answer 3

That isn't a crazy amount of stuff to be operating at the same time. Make sure computers and tv are plugged into different outlets. Get a decent surge protect for computer.Then find out house ampage. If there are a few apts in house each apt should be on sep lines. If not separated, that is definately a problem and prob. illegal on ur landlord's part.
Resetting the breaker is not a solution. good luck

Answer 4

What is the rating (Amps) for that breaker that keeps tripping? What is the wattage of those few lamps?, How many are there? Too many variables to give an educated answer. Crappy wiring won't usually blow breakers, it sounds like you might need another circuit, and in that case your landlord should be the one responsible for getting it done.
Good luck.

Answer 5

Here's what you do. Add up the load in watts you have on at maximum. The bulbs are easy and there will be a name plate on each appliance giving the watts used. Divide that figure by 120 and that will give you the number of amperes you are using at any one time. That number of amperes needs to be 80 per cent or less of the number of amperes on the circuit breaker that trips. If the number is at or above 80 per cent of the breaker value, it will trip regularly. If the figure is below the 80 per cent value of the breaker, he needs to change the breaker. Don't forget to add in refrigerator and other appliances.