3 Reasons you lost power to your work station
Commercial office furniture such as cubicles and work stations come in all shapes and sizes, some big some small. What almost all of them have in common though is a built in electric raceway. These raceways have outlets that are snapped in and ready to use. The circuits feeding these cubicles tend to be the most common circuits that people complain about losing power to. Here are the three most common reasons you lost power to your work station.
1) Heater or other high amperage device was plugged in.
2) The snap in raceway came undone.
3) Wrong receptacles were installed.
1) During the winter time it is very common for people to bring in a little heater to the office to keep their areas warm. All though they do keep an area comfortable, in my experience they are one of the most common reasons that a circuit trips. Typically a circuit for a work station is a 20 amp circuit. That means that the circuit can handle up to 20 amps before the breaker overloads and trips the circuit. With computers and computer monitors drawing such low amounts of amperage there is room for additional loads to be put on these circuits. The problem here is that mini heaters tend to draw a large amount of amperage. A heater can draw anywhere from 10-15 amps. Now you may get lucky and be able to plug one in and fire it up without tripping the breaker but as more people start using their work stations and plugging in their own heaters, it is far to much for the circuit to handle which causes the breaker to trip. This issue is most common in colder weather states and during the winter time, the majority of the time it is the reason for the tripped breaker. This is the easiest to trouble shoot because all you need to do is unplug the heaters or other high wattage devices and then turn the circuit back on. If you don’t have any heaters currently plugged in here are a couple more reasons why you lost power to your work station.
2) The second reason you may have lost power to your work station is because the snap in raceway for the furniture has become loose. Typically the raceways for power in the furniture are run on the bottom behind a panel that can snap out if work needs to be done. They are almost always plug and play raceways, meaning the raceway is snapped together until you have enough raceway for your specific furniture. When office furniture and workstations are installed, they are assembled by the furniture company. In that assembly it includes putting together the raceway for the power to the individual cubes. Typically, a certified electrician is not involved in putting together the furniture at all. So these connections for the raceways have a tendency to come undone. This can be confusing for someone trying to trouble shoot the issue because when they go to the breaker they will find that it is not tripped but there is still no power to the work station. The easiest way to trouble shoot this problem is to start in the area closest to the main power connection. Start by testing all the outlets, you will find that there is power feeding the outlets closest to the main connection and at some point down the line you will lose power. Where ever your first outlet without power is you will know the issue is right before that. Once you spot that location the problem can be easily fixed. All you need to do is find the nearest location that the raceway is snapped together and either unplug it and plug it back in or give it a little elbow grease and push it together. This problem is the easiest to fix assuming that the raceway isn’t broke. If you find that after you have unplugged it and plugged it back in there is still no power then likely the issue is internal with the raceway and it may have to be replaced. The next step if you believe this is the issue and trouble shooting on your own is not working would be to call a certified electrician to check the main splice and well as check the raceway using an amp meter.
3) The last most common reason for losing power to a work station has to do with the installation process as well. Commonly there are multiple circuits feeding the work station and in order to use each circuit a different outlet will be plugged into each station as to not overload one circuit. These outlets are typically labeled 1-4 (in roman numerals or regular numbers). The different numbers on the outlet are representing which circuit from the main feed that outlet is using. A lot of times there will be 2-3 different circuits brought to each cubicle. If when installed these outlets are not carefully noted and installed correctly, then one circuit can become overloaded. For example if the installed puts only number 1 outlets in every cube and nothing else, all the power for the workstation will be running through one circuit and the other circuit will be unused. The best way to trouble shoot this particular problem is to first see that the breaker is tripped. If the breaker is tripped then you can go to the work station and see if any one is plugging in any high wattage devices, such as the heaters we talked about earlier. If there are no high wattage devices being plugged in then you can visually inspect all the outlets in the furniture to see if all the outlets are the same. If you see all the outlets with the same number on them then most likely you have spotted the problem.
In my experience when an office furniture or work station loses power these are the most common reasons why. All of these issues require pretty easy fixes that anyone can trouble shoot and do. A typical site visit for an electrician can run you $200-$500 dollars even for something as simple as trouble shooting and fixing the issues above. Don’t waste the money, if you use these steps you will be able to resolve the issue yourself.