new LC1390N (80 watt) that completely lost power- in machine gfci flips it off

[Sonja Pete]

No problem, I appreciate any help!

[Matt McCoy]

What is that ground wire connected to (bottom left, first pic)?

[Bill George]

The pictures are rotated so its very difficult to compare one side to the other. It looks like they are using green/yellow marked FC as Frame Ground, and it appears to go to a ground connection... on the plastic. So that means they are using Green and Red as hot wires but do not appear to have a wire for the neutral, which in this country would be white and solid green is frame ground. A GFI needs to see both sides of the line input, as a neutral and hot wire to compare. It trips on the un-balance between the two. A GFI does not need a ground to work, but needs to see both sides of the line.

Edit I am going with wired wrong, the picture on the Chinese website clearly shows a N terminal for the Neutral wire. If that's not hooked up then it will always see the "unbalance" and trip.

Your device is a combo GFI, circuit breaker and a power relay. https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...479089279.html
So its either wired wrong or defective. Plan B Call an electrician who knows about controls, a run of the mill house wiring guy would be clueless.
Or A call the people you purchased from.

Edit again.... that GFI or switch appears to only be feeding that outlet? Are you sure there is not another On-Off switch someplace on the machine?? Another picture of the complete power panel rotated the correct way would help.

[Kev Williams]

Ummm... I'm not an electrician, however, I'm pretty sure >edit< the GFI in your machine <edit> has a ground wire connected to it and NOT the neutral wire---The whole point of a GFI is detect current differential between the line current and the neutral return current-- if a differential DOES EXIST, this which indicates current flowing somewhere else, usually to the ground. This is what trips a GFI.

With a ground wire connected to the GFI, there's no current to measure, which is (I think) essentially a 100% ground fault as far as the GFI is concerned...

[Sonja Pete]

The pictures are rotated so its very difficult to compare one side to the other. It looks like they are using green/yellow marked FC as Frame Ground, and it appears to go to a ground connection... on the plastic. So that means they are using Green and Red as hot wires but do not appear to have a wire for the neutral, which in this country would be white and solid green is frame ground. A GFI needs to see both sides of the line input, as a neutral and hot wire to compare. It trips on the un-balance between the two. A GFI does not need a ground to work, but needs to see both sides of the line.

Edit I am going with wired wrong, the picture on the Chinese website clearly shows a N terminal for the Neutral wire. If that's not hooked up then it will always see the "unbalance" and trip.

Your device is a combo GFI, circuit breaker and a power relay. https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...479089279.html
So its either wired wrong or defective. Plan B Call an electrician who knows about controls, a run of the mill house wiring guy would be clueless.
Or A call the people you purchased from.

Edit again.... that GFI or switch appears to only be feeding that outlet? Are you sure there is not another On-Off switch someplace on the machine?? Another picture of the complete power panel rotated the correct way would help.

THANK YOU!!!!!
there is the on/off in the front of the machine that takes a key and an emergency stop button- in any combination of turning the machine on the gfi flips it off.
here are some pics- starting from gfi going to the left to the main panel then up to the on/off key switch and emergency button. not included is power supply (i have replaced that and have the same issues- so ruled that out)

gfcibackinsideout.jpgGFIupperRight.jpgMainPanel.jpgKeySwitchandEmergncyStopButton.jpg

[Sonja Pete]

Thanks Kevin! gathering your knowledge!

[Bill George]

So the outlet is not an outlet its a input power connection to a cord end. I think they are using the solid green as Neutral. However if the solid green is connected to the hot or black wire it is wrong and will trip. GFI's do not need a ground wire to work, they do need to see both sides of the circuit.

Sonja, do you have a grounded outlet the machine is plugged into? It might be as simple as the white and black wire are switched so the GFI is seeing a reversed connection. Either in the machine power connection or in the house circuit. Home Depot and others sell those outlet polarity plugs, about $5 that would prove the white, black and ground connections are correct in the house anyway.

[John Lifer]

I can't tell from your picture but try one thing before anything else. Disconnect the external ground wire you have attached at the back of the machine.
It looks like it is connected to something other than a ground wire, but I can't tell for sure. Just carefully do that, and try to start the machine.

If that doesn't work, then you need to trace down the wires from the initial plug connection thru the switch GFCI, to the outlets (which don't matter if you don't have anything plugged into them, (but might later) to the power supply. I'm really assuming that they wired the switch up somewhat correctly to test the machine in the factory, but were too lazy to connect a ground wire. And the ground cable connection is to the neutral and ground side of the power. (kind of looks that way in your picture. That would probably trip the GFCI in most cases. You are combining neutral and ground.

Another other possibility is that your outlet is wired wrong. Neutral on wrong side of outlet. That does matter to a GFCI.
But I'm betting on wrong wiring.

[Bill George]

John the yellow/green wire is equipment or frame ground FG as they have it marked here. It seems to be wired like the Red is hot and solid Green is neutral. But like you said if those are reversed somewhere.... in the house or cord or anywhere the GFI might trip. .

I do not know that for a fact because I have never wired one in reverse!! From what I am finding online is the old GFIs did not care but the new ones might?
Lets hope they did not attach that solid Green to equipment ground somewhere!!

[Sonja Pete]

John the yellow/green wire is equipment or frame ground FG as they have it marked here. It seems to be wired like the Red is hot and solid Green is neutral. But like you said if those are reversed somewhere.... in the house or cord or anywhere the GFI might trip. .

I do not know that for a fact because I have never wired one in reverse!! From what I am finding online is the old GFIs did not care but the new ones might?
Lets hope they did not attach that solid Green to equipment ground somewhere!!

Wow, hmm, I have been plugging into grounded outlets-
I can go and get a outlet polarity plugs to test?

[Sonja Pete]

Wow, hmm, I have been plugging into grounded outlets-
I can go and get a outlet polarity plugs to test?

I tested the outlet that the lasercutter is plugged into and it came out as correct. so......

[Kev Williams]

The more I look at that 'wired' pic the more confusing it is-- All the yellow/green striped wires are connected together by virtue of the frame lug, so those are definitely ground wires.

The (I'll call it) turquoise wire then is neutral and the red hot--

Try as I might, I can't fit the 2 pics together, meaning, I don't think the switch and test button pic is the opposite side of the 'wired' pic....
reason being, there's 3 pairs of red and turquoise wires in the pic: a pair coming from the bottom up and connected to the right side of the top-right 'box' (the GFI?), a second pair that comes from the bottom up and dead-ends at the lower-left connector, and the last pair leaves the left side of the top-right box and dead-ends at the top LEFT connector...? The dead-ends have me baffled, unless the opposite sides of at least one of those left-side connectors is line-in power... If this is true, then the GFI pic isn't the opposite side of the wired pic...

It's still puzzling, since all the GFI's I've dealt are much simpler than this! A breaker GFI is exactly like any other breaker except for ONE extra white coiled wire (usually) that connects to the neutral bus. And outlet GFI's just have specific 'line' and 'load' posts to wire to, nothing extra at all...

So, what are those 2 connectors, actually?

[John Lifer]

I tested the outlet that the lasercutter is plugged into and it came out as correct. so......

Good, that eliminates that minor potential, but did you take off that outside single ground wire and try it? Again small probability, but possible.

If it is tripping, something IS miswired.

[Bill George]

Its confusing because a couple of the pictures are rotated and the GFI is not just a GFI its a combo of some sort. Since that single outlet is really a power input as we all have on our desktop computers, printers and the like.

The simple thing to do first is what John said take off that un needed ground wire., Second try to switch those green/ turquoise wire and red wire around. No go? Put back the same way and start the troubleshooting as I said a few posts ago, one wire at a time.

But are we dealing with a GFI fault? Or a overload, as short or ground? You really don't need a GFI on a machine such as this, circuit breaker, sure maybe. Is the GFI button tripping or the red handle tripping like a CB would be? Its also possible the GFI / switch is bad.

Proof for that would be to bypass and plug directly into a fused cord set after the testing above found nothing.

[John Lifer]

Ok, a couple of things. I looked up the 'switch' and it is a single pole breaker with earth leakage circuit. Yes, a gfi circuit I think.
I also adjusted your image and I can see that the Yellow with Green stripe is GROUND. Now I Cannot see which terminal it is connected to on the back of the incoming plug. Make sure it is the center ground. It does appear that it is ground on the outlet strips.
Now the single pole breaker may not be connected correctly, I can't see wiring diagram on front and can't get readable elsewhere. From what I think I see, the Green wire is run thru the single pole breaker and the red is straight thru. That MIGHT be backwards and causing a trip. can't tell from here. it is functioning as gfi it appears.
Best I can do for tracing.

I'm with Gary, really don't need gfi, it is for the outlets, don't use them. And It IS ok to bypass the switch also, especially if you have a breaker of about 15 or max 20 amps supplying the power to that circuit for the laser. At least to test to determine if switch is bad.

If you proceed with the following, Remove every other item from the circuit that is powering the laser. At least till you test. If it comes on, add your water pump/chiller to test further.

I would probably remove the green and red on the lower connection for the switch, and connect directly to back of the plug where the red and green are coming in now. (insuring they are the left and right terminals first and Yellow green stripe is center ground per above)
Then cut off your main power breaker for this circuit, connect cable to laser, plug into outlet and flip house(store) breaker on. If breaker stays on, try to power up machine. If it trips breaker, something is seriously crossed up! Stop and determine what it is before powering up again!

Oh, BTW, I DO see a fuse beneath the power cord outlet. So you have protection there also.