Electrical breaker mystery use

I’ve just gone through testing and labeling all of the electrical breakers. I know the source for each light/receptacle/appliance located inside, outside and under the house as well as in the attic.

I still have 4 breakers that are wired up and I have no idea what they go to. I’ve had them turned off for a couple of days and haven’t had any issues, but to be fair, a lot of the house is seldom used by just two of us.

Is there are way to sort out where a wire goes to once it leaves the electrical panel?

Line finders.

I’ve NOT used these, but they purport to answer your question.

See:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=electrical+tone+finder&t=h_&am…

Line finders.

I’ve NOT used these, but a friend has.

They purport to answer your question.

(Not expensive. ~~~$30.)

See:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=electrical+tone+finder&t=h_&am…

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We had our panel replaced a few years ago so all our circuit breakers are neatly labeled. But if they weren’t, two would baffle someone trying to track down what outlets or devices they serviced. One is to a light in an attic; the other is to a light in a crawl space. Do you have anything like that?

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But if they weren’t, two would baffle someone trying to track down what outlets or devices they serviced. One is to a light in an attic; the other is to a light in a crawl space. Do you have anything like that?

I got the crawlspace lights and the attic has a couple of junction boxes, each with their own breaker, that are pre-wired for whatever you might need.

As an aside, funny the things people do - One of the breakers handles the 4 outside lights on the front of the house, the laundry room, half bath, hallway, foyer, and the receptacles in my bedroom. I thought it a bit excessive, but they made up for it on the next breaker which only powers the ceiling light in my bedroom.

Tone tracers might work, but since all the breakers have common connections, isolation of just the hot wire might not work so well. Maybe shutting off all the other breakers as well as the one you are chasing would help the mystery line to be heard, but if it is too far from the ceiling, it could be lost to the sensor…Other than curiosity, I’d be temped to just leave them off, marked as Unknown…

I’ve chased out all of my sub panel, made up an Excell sheet with notes on some that have odd links… Older homes like this one from '67, were way underserved. one breaker serves 2 bathrooms, and the master BR & closet… Along the way, a GFCI was added in the master bath that if tested, kills that bathroom & the master BR!

In today’s world few things draw a lot of current, but in our kitchen the counter outlets should have been on 2 or 3 breakers, if too many things, George Grill, Air Fryer, or Toaster is used but can pop the breaker, but access is so difficult we just work around it… I wish we has a basement, with the sub panel there, I could fix it, but with the sub on an interior wall, no overhead access, it is what it is… and will stay that way…

I have one of those line tracers, and it is occasionally helpful. Also occasionally not, as when wires are bundled together (like when they come into a panel) there is bleed or crosstalk. So sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Also the one I have only works in the other direction: you put the tone sender into a socket and then the tone sensor “finds” the breaker as you move it over the panel box. I don’t know how you would reverse that.

So, since that’s probably not helpful, here is a list of things I have found at various houses that might fit the bill:

Hot tub heater
Swimming pool filter
Exterior outlets front
Exterior outlets back
Security lights
Basement refrigerator or freezer (which by code have to have their own circuit)
Garbage disposal and/or dishwasher circuit
Walkway light
Outbuilding circuit
Security system
Garage door opener
Deck plugs

And the last one I can think of, very unlikely, is a double run to quad boxes in a workshop our elsewhere. A friend just redid his workshop and ran separate circuits to each quad box so the load from power saws and other heavy current draws would be split up, and if he pops a circuit he can change to the other plug (his workshop is in an outbuilding pretty far from the panel box.)

These things have been around forever, I have a couple like this one, another by Greenlee, but basically the same game… Used in the telecom world, but handy in others… An ethernet jack is handy, too… Hidden wiring, drywalled over or multiple, unmarked runs…

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003426056825.html

isolate and clip only the lead to be chased and try to follow the warmly tone… But if there is anything blogged in, the tone will go through that transformer or other circuit and feed back into the other connected circuits, so yes, indeed, it gets squirrely to find the one you are after without some idea of the destination…

Another name was Fox n Hound, but the same game…

Amazon delivered this today - talk about instant gratification. :slight_smile:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07VYN98QV/

Will give it a shot tomorrow after work.

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Amazon delivered this today - talk about instant gratification. :slight_smile:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07VYN98QV/

Will give it a shot tomorrow after work.

Right off the bat I tried it on a dead end electrical wire I found sticking out of the ground in the back yard. (The previous owners had an above ground pool in that area.) Once the wire dove underground the device was not effective.

Had to wait until today before I could have the house to myself and turn off the main breaker.

It took about 3 hours to sort out the ultimate destinations serviced by these 4 breakers, mostly because of repeated trips between the breaker panel and areas that are very inconvenient to access.

Where the tested wire runs parallel to other wires, they can pick up the signal and maintain it even after they separate. It does take some finesse because you then have to key into the relative volume of the tone as you get next to each wire. The tested wire will emit a louder tone.

At any rate, it was $70 well spent even if I never use it again.

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At any rate, it was $70 well spent even if I never use it again.

Great report; thanks for taking the time to write.

Think I’ll get one of the framises myself. I have some tracing I need to sort out.

(Not mystery breakers, but a couple that feed outlets that are far separate from each other. Nonsensical.)

Not mystery breakers, but a couple that feed outlets that are far separate from each other. Nonsensical

The cheap way to do this is to plug a radio into the outlet, turn it up loud, and then go to the breaker panel and switch off breakers until the sound goes off. Now you know what circuit it’s on.

I suppose if you had two radios you might tune one to a music station and one to a talk show and discern the difference, but the talk show has the danger of damaging your brain :wink:

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