If you’re someone who diligently washes everyone’s clothes in your household, then you probably use a dryer to wring the fabric off quickly.
However, a concern in using dryers constantly is that there may come a day where they blow a fuse or other circuitry parts in your household. A dryer tripping breaker is an electrical hazard you’d want fixed as soon as possible.
If your dryer trips breaker immediately every use, then you may have a problem with your circuitry. If you want to know “why does my dryer keep tripping the breaker” then this article is for you.
Table of Contents
Why Your Dryer Keeps Tripping Breaker
If you’re curious as to why your dryer keeps blowing breaker, then I’ve listed an index of probable causes.
1. Bad Dryer Motor
Before investigating your circuitry for the cause of the tripping breaker, you may want to check first the internal mechanisms of your dryer. If your dryer trips breaker after 10 minutes of use, you might have a malfunctioning motor.
Turn off the dryer’s electrical source. Pull out the motor and test it for continuity using a multimeter. If there’s a short, you’ll need to replace the motor.
Another way to check the motor is to examine the bearings. The bearings I mention here are the internal parts that ensure that your machine’s motors are running normally. As such, their importance in making sure that your machine’s running correctly cannot be understated.
Due to constant use, your bearings might become bogged down and clogged with dust, preventing the motor from reaching its normal operational speed. This causes the dryer to utilize more current, which could lead to your dryer tripping a breaker.
2. Faulty Start Switch
I recommend that you check whether your dryer’s start switch is stuck at a “run” position.
This is bad, as an automatic “run” position is damaging for both the machine and your circuitry. It draws high currents for longer periods of time, placing undue stress on your breaker and tripping it.
3. Loose Wires in Terminal Block
All the electrical connections of a dryer first go through a terminal block, which accordingly distributes power throughout the machine. Thus, if a component in the terminal block is faulty, then your dryer may inadvertently trip your breaker accidentally.
Check if your dryer’s terminal block has loose wires that cause electrical arcing, shorting your machine’s connection to the circuitry.
4. Faulty Heating Element
This part is solely responsible for producing the necessary heat that dries your clothes. It is what supplies the hot air inside the machine while it’s operating. As it is an essential component in your dryer, it may be in the best of your interest to also check this part of your dryer.
A broken heating element can cause an internal short circuit, which can cause your breaker’s constant tripping.
5. Bad Thermostat
This is yet another internal mechanism that may cause your machine to trip your breaker constantly. As the thermostat is responsible for tweaking the temperature of your dryer, a faulty one may draw in more heat than intended, pulling in more current.
Hence, a broken thermostat could draw in too much power, which could exceed your breaker’s maximum electrical capacity. I highly recommend that you check this part out before proceeding with the circuitry itself.
6. Faulty Breaker
If your dryer keeps tripping breakers even after you have checked everything above, then it may be time to inspect now whether it is your breaker that’s causing all the unwanted circuit tripping.
Chiefly, a faulty breaker might be to blame for your dryer-breaker issue. Aside from it being faulty, your breaker may not be rated to handle such an electricity-intensive appliance.
Hence, I highly recommend that you check your breaker’s condition by using a digital multimeter. Just hook it up and check the readings for yourself to determine whether your breaker needs replacing or not.
Conclusion
Why does my dryer keep tripping the breaker? This may be a concern for homeowners plagued with the constant sound of tripping breakers every time they use their drying appliance. I, too, would fret if my dryer kept tripping my breaker.
In this case, I have written this article to help you pinpoint the main issue as to why your dryer constantly trips your circuit breaker.
I can only hope that I have answered your query. If you want to add something or have any questions about this guide, you may want to share your thoughts down below.
I am Edwin Jones, in charge of designing content for Galvinpower. I aspire to use my experiences in marketing to create reliable and necessary information to help our readers. It has been fun to work with Andrew and apply his incredible knowledge to our content.