3

I rent a house in the US and recently have decided I’d like to add a refrigerator and exercise treadmill to my garage. The washer and dryer are already plugged into a receptacle in the garage so I was hoping that the new additions could plug into a second receptacle.

I don’t want to trip any breakers with all these new appliances, especially if they were all to run at the same time so I tried to figure out if the washer/dryer are on their own dedicated circuit, as well as which circuit powers the receptacle I’d like to use for the new additions.

I’m green when it comes to this sort of stuff. In my panel box there’s a circuit labeled “washer/dryer” but flipping it off does not power off anything in the house. I’ve tried the other breakers and combinations of them but nothing seems to power off the washer/dryer or the other garage receptacle. The ONLY thing that works is flipping off the 100amp double pole breaker, which shuts off everything in the house as well.

What’s going on here?

Can I safely assume that adding a treadmill and fridge to the garage won’t create excessive electrical load, since they are seemingly on a 100 amp breaker?

(I feel like I’m missing something here)

panel breaker

Alaska Man
  • 13,551
  • 2
  • 19
  • 30
Hunter
  • 31
  • 1
  • Try shutting all the breakers off at the same time except for the 100 Amp breaker. It's not uncommon for the labeling on the panel to be all wrong. Then check the garage for power. – JACK Mar 13 '21 at 18:42
  • Have you tried turning off all of the breakers (other than the main) at the same time or just one by one? – DoxyLover Mar 13 '21 at 18:44
  • Any other breakers on that meter center?? – JACK Mar 13 '21 at 18:44
  • Thanks, I can’t at the moment but I’ll give that a shot in a few hours. But what would that tell me? That I missed some combination? – Hunter Mar 13 '21 at 18:45
  • And no, these are all the breakers – Hunter Mar 13 '21 at 18:46
  • 2
    Is there any chance there's a subpanel in the garage? Can you take a picture of the washer/dryer receptacles? And btw, 13 and 14 should probably be tied together at the handles. – Aloysius Defenestrate Mar 13 '21 at 19:08
  • Can you post a photo of any labeling on the inside of the meter-center's door? Also, it sounds like you need to go on a subpanel scavenger hunt, because clearly this can't be the only panel in the house... – ThreePhaseEel Mar 13 '21 at 19:16
  • 1
    You mention that you rent. Electrical work is usually done by licensed electricians with landlord approval on rental properties per local ordinances. The “work allowed to be done directly by homeowner” clauses usually don’t apply because you are a renter and the homeowner... well nobody wants slumlords who hack together unsafe electrical solutions instead of calling in a licensed electrician to make sure its done properly. In either case, is your landlord cool with you doing the work? – statueuphemism Mar 13 '21 at 19:22
  • Presumably a gas dryer? If not, there almost has to be a sub-panel someplace, unless it's connected to 13-14 (which are not handle-tied, and should be, but not by you) instead of the very faded "A/C" – Ecnerwal Mar 13 '21 at 19:47
  • Consider this: NEC 210.11(C)(2) Laundry Branch Circuits. In addition to the number of branch circuits required by other parts of this section, at least one additional 20-ampere branch circuit shall be provided to supply the laundry receptacle outlet(s) required by 210.52(F). This circuit shall have no other outlets. – NoSparksPlease Mar 13 '21 at 19:49
  • Thank you all for the responses!

    I flipped off all the breakers except for the 100 Amp, and that shut off the washer and dryer! I then flipped back on each breaker, one at a time, and checked what turned on. Pretty much everything is labeled incorrectly...and I'm confused as to why certain things are on the same circuit. It seems that the washer/dryer run on the same circuit as the bathroom lights (share a wall), as well as the outlets in 3 bedrooms that we happen to use for our PCs.

    On the other hand, the 2nd receptacle in the garage is on the same circuit as the bedroom lights...

     – Hunter Mar 13 '21 at 20:52
  • I've also searched inside and outside the house, and there doesn't seem to be any sort of subpanel.

    And as for doing any electrical work, I have no knowledge of how to even attempt it, nor would I risk damaging part of the house or injuring myself and others. I'm simply trying to understand the implications of plugging in other objects into the outlets!

     – Hunter Mar 13 '21 at 20:54

1 Answers1

1

As a renter, your "work" can only consist of trying to track down what the actual relationship of circuits to locations is (see if there's another spot that "looks like" it could have had a washer/dryer, for instance) and trying the devices you want to run on the outlets you want to run them on to see if a breaker trips, or not - given that modern refrigerators are usually small loads (mine does 50-60W unless it's defrosting at 200W) your main likely issue with overloading would be don't wash and dry and treadmill at the same time.

We have some previous questions and answers about tracking down circuits. Labelling is often outdated or wrong - just be systematic and make a note of what breaker affects each device location.

Any electrical work on a rental has to be done by a licensed electrician (as others already commented.)

Ecnerwal
  • 213,340
  • 10
  • 261
  • 571
  • Circuit mapping: https://diy.stackexchange.com/a/36917/18078 – Ecnerwal Mar 13 '21 at 19:42
  • Thank you for the response! I definitely am not going to be doing any electrical work on this house, nor do I have the knowhow to even attempt. As you stated, I'm purely just trying to understand the layout of the circuits and the implications of adding more electrically operated objects (treadmill, fridge, etc.)

    As for refrigerator loads, I understand that their running loads are low, like you stated, but how about their "starting loads"? A quick google search is showing me numbers in the 1000-2000W range

     – Hunter Mar 13 '21 at 21:01