rrauenza
New Member
Hi,
I'm having a strange GFCI problem.
I have a lamp post in our driveway that has underground wiring. It goes through a GFCI box before heading underground. It is UF cable, mostly in a PVC conduit. (comes down the wall in a flex pipe, goes under some gravel, then into the conduit, then to the lamp post base, and up)
Some time ago I nicked the cable and so spliced it. First I used one of those shrink wrap kits from home depot -- worked for a while, then shorted - tripped the GFCI. I removed it and just wire nutted it with "waterproof" nuts and put a plastic irrigation box over it and left the wires uncovered by the gravel. It worked fine in this state - no trips.
Not happy with that (and I shouldn't be... shame on me), I intended to eventually just run a new line -- but then I saw the Uraseal products. So I ordered one, stuffed the splice into one of their products, let it cure, and .. what? It trips again! It's not buried yet -- it is still in the open air.
I took apart the GFCI box, found another in my box from a remodel (covered in paint..), and it also trips. Disconnected the load wires, and it doesn't trip. Measured the ohms from the hot to neutral/ground load wires: infinite ohms. (is the multimeter just too low of voltage to pick up the leak?)
I'm about to just throw my hands up and try to pull a new cable.
Anything else I should do to troubleshoot this?
I'm having a strange GFCI problem.
I have a lamp post in our driveway that has underground wiring. It goes through a GFCI box before heading underground. It is UF cable, mostly in a PVC conduit. (comes down the wall in a flex pipe, goes under some gravel, then into the conduit, then to the lamp post base, and up)
Some time ago I nicked the cable and so spliced it. First I used one of those shrink wrap kits from home depot -- worked for a while, then shorted - tripped the GFCI. I removed it and just wire nutted it with "waterproof" nuts and put a plastic irrigation box over it and left the wires uncovered by the gravel. It worked fine in this state - no trips.
Not happy with that (and I shouldn't be... shame on me), I intended to eventually just run a new line -- but then I saw the Uraseal products. So I ordered one, stuffed the splice into one of their products, let it cure, and .. what? It trips again! It's not buried yet -- it is still in the open air.
I took apart the GFCI box, found another in my box from a remodel (covered in paint..), and it also trips. Disconnected the load wires, and it doesn't trip. Measured the ohms from the hot to neutral/ground load wires: infinite ohms. (is the multimeter just too low of voltage to pick up the leak?)
I'm about to just throw my hands up and try to pull a new cable.
Anything else I should do to troubleshoot this?