[Samoa]

Breaker tripping

 

[chandler48]

Welcome to the forums. You gotta give us a bunch more information than you did in your post. When does it trip? What brand MiniSplit, What size breaker is it on? Does it repeatedly trip the breaker?

 

[Samoa]

Senville, 12,000 BTU, 115VAC, 12 gauge wire, 20 amp breaker, disconnect box. tripped right away.

 

[anderep]

Did it ever work?

 

[afjes2015]

Is this a new installation? If so how was it wired. Pictures of the disconnect would help.
What type of breaker - Regular, GFCI?

Please understand, if we are to troubleshoot for you which we are here to do we need as much information as possible. Equate this to going to your doctor, sitting on the exam table and saying "Doc I don't feel good" and then you leave it at that not telling the doctor your symptoms etc. Much will be guess work. With electrical we really don't like to guess as it can be extremely dangerous to you.

We will put our time in to help you but you have to put your time in to explain as much as possible.

Thanks

 

[Jim Port]

An instant trip tell you have a dead short, possibly not a unit issue. Pull the disconnect and try the breaker.

 

[Samoa]

new installation, 12 gauge, 2 wire, black wire to 20 amp breaker single pole regular, white wire to the bus bar, ground to ground bar, black to left side of disconnect box, white to right side. Wiring to unit is Black wire from left side of disconnect box to unit L screw, white wire from right side of disconnect box to N screw.

 

[Jim Port]

Does the breaker stay on with the disconnect off?

Is the unit 120 or 240 volt?

 

[Samoa]

Yes, it stays on, 120V

Does the breaker stay on with the disconnect off? Is the unit 120 or 240 volt?

 

[Samoa]

 

[Jim Port]

The blades of the disconnect are creating a dead short from hot to neutral. Remove the neutrals from the terminals and splice with a wire nut.

 

[A Little Short]

The blades of the disconnect are creating a dead short from hot to neutral. Remove the neutrals from the terminals and splice with a wire nut.

Correct!
In fact those neutrals don't even need to be on the line or load terminals. They just need to be wire nutted together and not connected to any part of the disconnect, or housing.

 

[seharper]

Are you guys sure? Here's the disconnect photo brightened up.

I agree the neutral doesn't need to go through the disconnect, but this doesn't look wrong.

 

[chandler48]

Isn't the disconnect plug wired 1-3 and 2-4 ? Or 1-4 and 2-3?

 

[A Little Short]

Edit: Thinking about this more. True, the neutrals shouldn't be on the terminals. But if the two outside lugs are "line" and the two inside are "load", all you're actually doing is disconnecting the neutral. That wouldn't cause a short, providing this is how this disconnect is to be wired. All I've wired are this way. Must be a short somewhere else.
Also, the nameplate says max fuse 25A, it could be tripping on start-up.

 

[Samoa]

We disconnected whites and marreted them together. Tada! I guess we had it wired in a 240 disconnect box instead of 120. Oops! Heat pump works! Yeah! Thanks guys for all your help. What a great resource Having this chat.

 

[chandler48]

Glad you got it fixed. We're here, just chime in anytime.

 

[C'est Moi]

I don't understand how wiring the whites together solved the problem. That doesn't make sense because as @seharper stated the connection in the disconnect is correct, IMO

 

[flyingron]

Senville, 12,000 BTU, 115VAC, 12 gauge wire, 20 amp breaker, disconnect box. tripped right away.

There's no way that is right. 12,000 BTU/hr is like 3000 watts and that equates to 29 A @ 120V.

 

[A Little Short]

We disconnected whites and marreted them together. Tada! I guess we had it wired in a 240 disconnect box instead of 120. Oops! Heat pump works! Yeah! Thanks guys for all your help. What a great resource Having this chat.

Did you change anything else? I know I initially said the neutrals were the problem, but changed what I said as the neutrals were only being disconnected, not shorted.