On Mon, Jan 21, 2008 at 03:43:36PM -0800, cornerexit wrote:
> I have a treadmill in my shop and have been experiencing difficulties with
> it tripping the gfci, or tripping the little internal breaker on the
> treadmill itself. Usually happens at about the 20 minute mark into a 30
> minute walk. Seems intermittent, some days it works fine other days not so
> much. Tends to trip more on me (heavier) than my son, obviously I'm putting
> a bigger load on it. Also trips more when it is cold out. It was 30 degrees
> in the shop today and the treadmill only made it 15 minutes into the
> session.
>
> Are treadmills usually pretty hard on a circuit? I've tried different gfci
> outlets and it still trips them. Should I pull the closest gfci outlet to
> the panel and replace it with a non gfci 20 amp outlet and see if still
> trips the breaker on the treadmill?
>
The GFCI trips when it detects a current imbalance between hot and neutral.
A large inductive load, like a big motor, can cause a GFCI to trip by mistake.
If your treadmill's internal breaker wasn't also tripping, I'd be inclined to
say this is a possible cause. But since you say the internal breaker is
also tripping, it sounds like something's wrong. Does the breaker trip if you
leave the treadmill running with nobody on it (ie. as close to no load on the
motor as possible)?
For what it's worth, I see similar GFCI behavior with my underground sprinkler
system. One zone in particular will occasionally cause the GFCI to trip.
It's very sporatic and when it does happen it's after that valve has
been active for 30-40 minutes. The valve box remains dry and I see no
obvious alternative path to ground. The solenoid in the valve draws no
more than 10VA so it's by no means a large inductive load.
I'm kind of scratching my head on this one. That it doesn't happen for
30-40 minutes suggests that maybe there's a problem in the solenoid's
windings or possibly a problem with the transformer powering the valves?
Jimmie
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