No Such Thing as an Electrical Failure

So what your saying that a mechanic does not have to do any diagnostic work. That the broken or damaged part is all that is to it. I find it's usually cause and effect in both trades work.

Good try though.

I purchase a metal lathe back in 2004. It had 100% China made electric contactors and switches. The first time I powered it from a RPC, it developed a hard short between phases in the forward motor rotation contactor. I replaced it with a part from the equipment seller. Via visual inspection, I could find no evidence of a short. The ohm meter said it was there, and the blown fuse said it was there. And hence the electrons said it was there. It was not there from the initial power application, but only after the motor failed to start from an undersized RFC into a 7.5HP motor.

So I would say from this experience that there are such things as electric failures.

Unless you believe insulation breakdown is not an electrical failure.

Oh! I was thinking of an open circuit, not a short circuit. It seems that lots of people call any kind of failure a short whether it is or not.

If that open circuit was in a water/oil/gas pipe, the plumber would not only have to repair the break but also mop up all the spilled fluid.

I've never heard of an electrician having to mop up spilled electrons. They're over paid!

Youv'e never heard of an electriacian trying to mop up spilled electrons beacuse the ones who tried are DEAD

Electrical breakdown may be chemical composition and internal mechanical structural failure.

... and the mechanical guys blame the production engineers, who blame the suppliers, who blame the materials guys,...

Really, "It's not my fault, I swear to God!"

Regarding the type of failure and more importantly - what you feel like calling it - is a matter of semantics. But, typically - if the purpose of the failed component is to carry/manipulate/manage/contain electricity - then it is an electrical failure.

But, to say that electricians do twice the amount of work as anyone else is really a stretch, and I'm kind of surprised that you would even suggest such a thing, so NO I absolutely do not agree. And since we were talking about semantics earlier, under the true definition of 'work' you might even do less ;-)

HVAC is easily the hardest trade....It encompasses all the trades, so you must know all the trades to be an A/C mechanic....

Daddy always said "Any fool can screw something up but it takes real skill for someone else to fix it!"

A friend of mine was a electronics tech. A customer came in with a receiver and stated that it had a "Brown Fruze" probably caused by an "open shoutage". Sometimes tech services can be fun.

Once the smoke is let out of the device it becomes a moot point.

If you doubt it? Then "Let an electrician check your shorts."

i agree wholeheartedly. An 'electrical failure' is a result, not a cause. (Insulation failure is not an electrical failure per se, it may be mechanical, chemical, ultraviolet, whatever.) Electricity is not visible ordinarily, so one can't see what happens when things go wrong. One has to use powers of observation, deduction, logic and even De Bono's methods sometimes, in short, brains. As opposed to physically seeing a malfunctioning mechanism. More power to us

It explains why there are so many Electrical queries at CR4. Only a select few are clever enough to solve them! I wonder why my battery went flat...did the electrons go on strike for better conditions? Oh but it must be a mechanical fault....

B***** me! The gardener just came by and solved the problem..don't ask, I didn't understand his explanation..too many metric system expletives involved.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Failure_modes_of_electronics

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2C40648121C5F257

http://www.wendellhull.com/electrical_failure_analysis.php

http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/electrical+failure

http://www.nfpa.org/press-room/news-releases/2012/electrical-failures-or-malfunctions-are-factors-in-more-than-46000-home-fires

These are just the first few results of over 59,900,000 results for a google search for "Electrical Failures" in 0.24 seconds.

It looks like you have your work cut out for you to convince the rest of the world.

Good Luck.

After reading all, electrical failure is just a misnomer or shortening of the true name - electrical component failure, which, indeed can be mechanical devices.

A bad breaker is an electrical failure ...call it what you want....a mechanical device, or as you may suggest, an electron gate. So you find the breaker ( where the electrons are held up) and you replace the breaker.......that's twice the work of any other profession? No, I don't agree. There are several technician jobs that require the ability to trouble shoot electrical systems. Without that ability they couldn't do their jobs. They are not called electricians...examples..HVAC tech, DDC tech, process controls tech....perhaps they should get twice the pay.

A beautiful day in Lisbon, on the flight deck, on an 8' ladder trying to extract a rudder trim tab actuator, from an access hole that testifies to the fact that the actuator was installed as the aircraft was being built, because the actuator had failed mechanically, to be approached by an officer and a camera crew, to be told to "Try and look busy, this is a French news camera crew".

What we have here is plainly a failure (of the electrons) to communicate, possibly by being interrupted by a bridge out condition in the path. Sometimes electrons (and holes) find the opposite problem, and find a road that should not be taken, then conditions heat up, and all traffic once again comes to a halt.

I agree with you. Most of the time sthe elcterical break down is related to other issues whcih are not entirely electrical in nature. Examples

Motor- Heavy load on connected equipmenst- Pumpos, mixer, etc.

Cards- Over heating- heavy load ( May eb some examples which are related to genuine heating even ta low loads).

Phase issue- problem with cable quality and loading,

Different perspective though. a clue to finding out root cause.