Help Needed with Sockets Tripping

[DIYphobia]

Hi, I'm looking for some advice on what could be wrong with one of the electricity circuits in my house.

Apologies in advance for not knowing all the correct terminology etc.

Last night my electricity went off, I checked the Circuit Breaker Box and managed to isolate the fault to the circuit that powers the plug sockets upstairs in the house. All the others are up and working OK, but as soon as I switch on the trip switch for the upstairs sockets, all the circuits go off except for the lights (which on my Circuit Breaker Box are separate to the others).

The house was re-wired 3 years ago, so everything including the Breaker Box is new.

I unplugged everything from all sockets upstairs in my house, but the trip switch will still not reset, and it trips all the others too (except the lights). Just to note, nothing additional was being plugged in at the time of the trip, the only things on were my son's xbox/tv and an alarm clock, so it shouldn't be overloaded.

Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong ? Many thanks in advance.

 

[rjm2k]

There may be other things wired off the ring upstairs such as your boiler, extractor fans and even lights (do you have an external light?), you may also find that some of the sockets downstairs are run from upstairs so it's a case of switch everything off and work from there.

Also, can you photo the fuse box and post on here pointing out which breakers are tripping? It sounds like the main RCD is being tripped when one of the other circuits is live.

 

[Aragorn84]

Presumably theres a fault between live and earth on that circuit, which is tripping the RCD. This might be an appliance, or a fault in the fixed wiring such as a damaged cable, water ingress etc.

If you've unplugged everything and its still doing it, then your going to have to get someone competent to disconnect the wiring and do some testing to try and identify where the short is occurring.

 

[DIYphobia]

Thanks for the replies.

I can certainly post a photo later today when I get home.

I'm fairly certain that nothing else is connected to that ring, the cooker and shower are on their own circuits, as are the kitchen and utility room, however it's easy enough to disconnect everything in the house and start from there, so I'll give it a try.

 

[Taylortwocities]

In many cases this will be caused by boiler/heating services, or an immersion heater.

There should be an isolating switch for the boiler, etc or a plug, switch it off, and try again.