I have a house that was built in 82 but had some obvious renovations done to it over the years. The wiring appears to be done relatively well but there are a couple things that make me scratch my head.

While attempting to replace the ceiling fan in the spare bedroom, I realized that the master bedroom outlets, spare bedroom light and outlets, a sun porch that has a half dozen outlets and a fan and the refrigerator in the kitchen are all on the same circuit which is protected by a 50a breaker. All of the outlets are 15a outlets so I assume that they're wired as such as well.

I've seen multiple rooms on the same circuit before but not on a 50a breaker. Is this something I need to be concerned about? I assume that's a lot of load to put on a 14/2 romex assuming that's what it's all wired with.

Thats a bad thing and a fire waiting to happen. breaker size is set for the wire size. 15 amp 14 ga, 20 amp 12 gauge, 30 amp 10 ga. etc fridge should have it's own clean 20 amp circuit, plugs in kitchen should have 2 20 amp circuits depending on the size of the kitchen on Gfci. with 14 ga wire on a 50 amp breaker your going to melt the wire before the breaker trips.

XLT is correct.

A 50 amp breaker requires 8 gauge wire. The purpose of the breaker is to prevent the wire from catching on fire.

I strongly urge you to replace that 50 amp breaker with a 15 amp breaker immediately if not sooner.

Next, I would suggest that you get a qualified electrician to evaluate the situation and correct it. This may cost some money but that would be cheaper than having the house burn down.

Sounds like a previous owner added too many loads to a 15A breaker, and moved up to a (way) larger breaker after the original kept blowing.

As has been stated that is a very dangerous fire hazard. Replace that 50A with a 15A breaker right now. You probably should shut off that circuit until you have the 15A installed.

Then find a way to split some of the loads that use 14 gauge wire on to more 15A breakers.

Yea, not good. Are you sure there hasn't been a sub panel added somewhere and fed by the 50 amp that you haven't seen? Attic, crawl space, closet... I've seen some things...

I'd remove the cover and look in the panel at the 50 amp breaker and see what size wire is attached to it. If you are not comfortable doing that it sounds like time to call the man...

quote:

Originally posted by cparktd:
Yea, not good. Are you sure there hasn't been a sub panel added somewhere and fed by the 50 amp that you haven't seen? Attic, crawl space, closet... I've seen some things...

I'd remove the cover and look in the panel at the 50 amp breaker and see what size wire is attached to it. If you are not comfortable doing that it sounds like time to call the man...

Yeah, it sounds like a sub panel is involved here. I'd see what wire is actually on the breaker and look for a possible sub panel.

I agree.... I would hope no one would do something like that... put 14 gage wire on a 50 amp breaker circuit.... that is just about as bad as you can get....

There is a sub panel but I thought it fed something else. I'll double check it before I do a anything else

The 50 amp breaker must feed the subpanel. Otherwise, as has been mentioned, switch out the oversized breaker before you have a fire.

What size wire is used at the outlets? That is what the breaker needs to be sized for.
You can have multiple 15a outlets on a 20a breaker and be okay.
As others have said 50a breaker is way out there. I would expect a sub panel somewhere.

If the 50A breaker is a double-pole (240v) breaker, then it's likely feeding a sub and not a circuit. Is it a two position breaker?