MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
ok before my flat burns down or I go mad, I need some help.
I have no power in my flat unless I turn the electric oven on, then ping! Everything comes on.
It's freaking me out. It started in that I noticed the microwave wasn't working. Went to the fuse box and saw a switch had been tripped, so flicked it back to 'on'. Microwave still not working so perhaps it's bust .
Anyhow, I then went to turn the oven on and all the power to tv , lamps, stereo etc cuts out. Switched the oven off, checked trip switches, nothing.
However it now seems that the only way I can have any sort of power is to switch the oven on... Even though it doesn't start heating anything.
Confused? I am . Hopefully it's an easy fix! All suggestions welcome
You need someone to look at that ASAP
I don't know the answer, but if I turn the top left ring of my decrepit oven on, it trips the whole house!
In your case, I'd recommend a slow cooked sausage, onion & red pepper casserole with plenty of smoked paprika to get you through the night.
Or an electrician.
(edit, it does sound a little serious if it's gone from tripping the electrics to being a conduit for the electrics?!)
We had various weirdness with the electrics - things like the fridge light was flickering unless the toaster was on.
Turned out that there had been some arcing in the consumer unit that had caused it to get hot, melt a bunch of insulation together and cause various voltage fluctuations. Only one circut (the smoke alarms!) had tripped properly - when I turned the breaker back on for that circuit (with an electrician in attendance) there was a full on bang, sparks, smoke - short to earth. This was before the unit was opened to find the melted insulation.
So we'd been pretty close to a fire... and the idiot original installer had put the consumer unit directly below the main gas inlet pipe.
Result was a new consumer unit, which was relocated away from the gas pipe.
TL:DR: Get an electrician out. There may be something potentially dangerous happening.
I could pop round and have a look if you like...
or perhaps get a proper sparky in. Sounds like a short somewhere
I think you either need an electrician or an exorcist
I must say it reminds me of the eggs cooking on the counter in Ghostbusters.
So, I think the idea is we switch it all off and wait until the morning , and when I try to cook a bacon sarnie and remember I need to turn my electric toothbrush on or something I'll call an electrician ASAP. Plan?
If youre going down that route (and it seems sensible) switch the mains off at the consumer unit and dont burn the house down with a candle .... would be too ironic 🙂
WCA is really good with electricity and fire
I had something similar. Turned out to be the cooker's wall switch thingy. I unscrewed it and one of the wires was all burnt and black. Rather than get my landlord to do any more corner-cutting electric work (and blame me while he was at it) I just pulled some fresh cable through the wall and swapped the switch unit.
Do you mean turn the oven on by the big switch on the wall, or by the twiddly knob on the oven itself?
If the oven stopped everything I'd suggest your main RCD has tripped, it may have tripped without showing as such... Turn all your breakers off then back on and see if that gets you going.
Twiddly knob on the oven. It's seriously weird.
Is it an oven or a cooker with rings for pans? Also, does it have any clocks or anything on it?
Do your lights work or is it the whole house that is off?
A picture of the consumer unit (fuse box) would be helpful.
Rich.
Anyone checked if the OP is still with us?
First dibs on his bikes if he is toast
First dibs on his bikes if he is toast
Mmmmm....
Crispy!
Sounds like a neutral earth fault on the switched side of your isolator.