Whilst getting things organised for the Garden party I am renting a friends apartment for a while as it is easier to be in Silistra rather than travelling back and forth 40km to the village, all is well apart from I am having a problem with the eletrics in the kitchen. When I went to make a coffee I plugged in the element thing that holds a cup of water. It part boiled then a lound noise - I quickly pulled the plug out and then plugged in the radio but it did not work - so I assume the plug socked fuse has blown. There was no other eletrical item on apart from the fridge. I tried the socked near the table and the water boiled ok so have been using that one however, just now the same thing happened again, that socked went bang. The water in the metal cup was covering the element so I don't know what is wrong. It is not the element as that is still working i tried it in the hall way.

I dare not use the cooker or any other appliance now just in case there is eletrical problem.

Seems like an short cucuit with the water boiler/element thingy, try the cooker with a pan of water. Dunno why it should bang otherwise, strange but only when reached boiling point. Did you bring it with you and have you used it before?

Edna Bira wrote:

Seems like an short cucuit with the water boiler/element thingy, try the cooker with a pan of water. Dunno why it should bang otherwise, strange but only when reached boiling point. Did you bring it with you and have you used it before?

Spot on Edna-Bira it was the element thing - The owner came along checked the fues box and the switch to both sockets had dropped down ie turning them off. He switched them back on again, plugged in the elements thing and it worked then went bang so it is a short circut in the element. So all sorted now just using the cooker and the pan. Thank goodness it was nothng I did.

Thanks for quick response.

A bit late with the explanation but yes, these things happen when the element gets hot and expands, which means it gets closer to the metal casing and as you discovered tripped the breaker, when it cools back down then it also shrinks back away from the metal, so in reality it could even be checked and not show the problem was the element.

But at least you have now solved the problem and learnt how to check the fuse board into the bargain.

My Turkish made electric samovar had a similar fault and when I checked the element the first thing that came to mind was that things like this just should never be allowed on the market, then again here in the UK they would not be.