Klein Tools ET450 Advanced Underground Circuit Breaker Finder and Wire Tracer Kit for Energized and Non-Energized Breakers, Fuses, and Wires

The dust motes dancing in the afternoon sun always seemed to mock me, a visible representation of the frustration I'd been battling for months. I’m not one for writing glowing reviews—I usually keep my opinions to myself—but the sheer quality and engineering I’ve found in Klein tools have become impossible to ignore. They simply make things that are built to last, tools you can trust when the chips are down. ​And the chips were definitely down. ​The well on my property had been acting up for months, a source of endless headaches and low water pressure for my family of four. I’d brought in a parade of so-called "experts," well companies who offered plenty of expensive advice but no real solutions. Every single one was unwilling to put in the hours, to roll up their sleeves and truly troubleshoot the core problem. The consensus was grim: drill a new well. ​But I had a second, forgotten wellhead on the property. "Dry," they had all declared, or at the very least, "not enough to support a family." I couldn't shake the feeling they were wrong, but to prove it, I faced a daunting task: connecting the waterline and the electrical conduit—a challenging 71-foot run between that lonely wellhead and the main well house. I couldn't just tear up the driveway or risk severing other hidden power lines to the house. I needed to know exactly what lay beneath the soil. ​For a week, I was glued to my computer, diving deep into obscure well forums. It was there, amidst the threads of seasoned DIYers, that one name popped up: the Klein Tools ET450 Advanced Underground Circuit Breaker Finder and Wire Tracer Kit. The reviews were mixed, of course. Some users swore it was a toy, others claimed it only worked for short distances. But I was desperate and frankly, pragmatic. I'd been quoted $1,900 just for a specialist to identify the underground lines. I thought, for a mere $230, why not try this tool and educate myself? ​I pulled the trigger and waited. ​The day it arrived, I was ready to treat the frontyard like a construction zone. What I can say now, with absolute certainty, is that this tool is the REAL deal. It took patience, yes. I had to learn its language, finetune the sensitivity settings, and train myself to listen to its signals. But once I did, it performed a miracle. ​The ET450 didn't just help me locate one thing; it mapped out the entire subsurface puzzle. It identified the exact, safe path for the new waterline and, crucially, the existing electrical wiring, all buried three to four feet underground. Not only did it save me from a costly excavation disaster, it located wires twice—and these wires were hiding under concrete! ​The knowledge I gained and the confidence I built by doing the work myself were invaluable. But the true, stunning payoff? This little kit saved me from the grim fate the experts had predicted. I didn't have to drill a new well, nor pay for additional, unnecessary troubleshooting support. ​My total estimated savings: an astonishing $82,000. That's not just a review—that's a testament to good old-fashioned quality meeting modern engineering, proving that sometimes, the only expert you need is a determined person with the right tool.

This Tracer worked perfectly, I found my underground in minutes. 3 -4 feet deep no problem at all, I think it would go even deeper with out a problem. I would recommend this product to everyone. I can’t believe the price. Klein does it again. Just a tip, I made an amateur mistake. If tracing a line from the panel make sure you turn off the other breakers in panel if wire is not disconnected. The signal was too weak to find under ground. I almost thought it didn’t work and I was about to send it back. But as soon as I turned off the breakers it started beeping from 10 feet away. Awesome product!!

Finally mapped all my downstairs sockets to the outside fuses. All while leaving everything energized so nobody in the house complained. All the accessories you need for that are in this kit, a proper test lead with a normal electrical plug as well. Sensitivity adjustment works extremely well, and the correct breaker was identified every single time with no doubt whatsoever. Plus it does all the tracing on non-energized circuits as well. I had ordered 2 other tracers to see if I can save a few dollars, they both go back. This is as good as it gets, and given the completeness accuracy and convenience of using, actually a great deal compared to the cheaper ones. Quality is as good or better than Fluke. And then, there is this: Since 1857, Klein Tools has been manufacturing tools in America, and it’s as important for the Klein family to keep that tradition now, as it was more than 150 years ago. You see, Klein isn’t just the name of our company; it’s also our family name, so we have to be proud of everything we make. Klein Tools continues to invest in U.S. manufacturing and is committed to maintaining its place as the favorite among electricians. Klein is the only major tool manufacturer worldwide focused on electrical and utility applications. No other manufacturer of hand tools and related products used in electrical applications makes more items in America than Klein Tools. Why buy anything else?

It takes some practice to be able to use this effectively. Read the manual! After you do the easy set up, it's amazing to be able to trace wires across your yard or though your house.

Worked great - used it to trace a hot outlet back to the breaker panel, and had to turn the sensitivity down on the probe to narrow down the exact breaker, so it had more than enough signal on a short (maybe 75 foot) run in conduit. Tried it on unpowered data wires to label the other end of the correct cable. Worked great so far, but haven't tried using to trace any power wiring underground yet. Very nice to have one tool that works for both finding un-powered data/signal/phone pairs, as well as plugging it right into powered outlets to find a breaker before even starting. The non-contact voltage sensing in the probe seems to work about as sensitive as my much smaller Fluke Volt-Alert pens do, but I've only tested this Klein probe on 120 VAC, not any lower voltage DC cabling yet where the Fluke pens still work. Very nice case to keep it all together and un-damaged in the tool bag or box, and I really like that they provided specific holders to put the batteries into, so you don't have to store them in the device or leave them rolling around the box, so they won't run down and leak if this doesn't get put into use for some period of time. I didn't need a lot of time in the manual, just checking over features and basic usage, and the buttons and screen display are fairly intuitive. You won't need to refer to the manual much again, but it's nice that it has a place inside the box for other users. If you're tracing underground wires, you only need to pay attention to finding a neutral or ground wire that's on a different circuit somewhere else before starting. If not, the signal path going both directions on a pair that are right next to each other are equal and opposite, and tend to cancel the signal strength enough that you may not find it. No problem with simple breaker locations though, and you can use the provided adapter to just plug the transmitter right into a standard outlet. On the down side, I really dislike that they required a screwdriver to open the battery covers. That's just lazy design, and more prone to breakage, stripping, or screw loss than a decent spring clip just built right into the battery cover. And they made a VERY strange decision on the larger transmit unit, where all but two of the batteries snap into the removable battery holder that you screw back down onto the device - but then 2 more batteries need to be snapped into slots back inside the unit before you put the battery cover back on. Very uncommon, and easily missed by someone who will come back and tell you it doesn't work, and you need to remember to ask if they had 2 extra batteries left over after putting them all in. If so, reopen the transmitter, and look for the extra 2 battery slots NOT near any of the rest of the batteries. All in all, a decent unit for the price, and it does double duty on hot and unpowered wires. I've paid more for just single use units. Definitely something worth adding to your tool set, that you'll find many uses for.

Update: The tracer does a dammed fair job of ringing out a couple thousand feet of communications cable as well. I was tracing and ringing out a building full of RS-485 building automation cable to determine the cause(s) for the network to fail when my Fox and Hound tracer failed. As I was nearing the end of the day, I pulled the breaker tracer and hooked it up, finding the system did as good a job on the unshielded cable connections and almost as good a job on the shielded cable. I'm impressed. I've used similar dead or live circuit tracers/breaker locators for up to 480v AC that cost as much as $1200 and, although this instrument is not quite as rock solid in the breaker location due to sensitivity to shared feeder backfeed, the performance for the price is quite good. The instructions could be improved to offer information to minimize the false signal issues, but an experienced user will have few issues and may already know many of the tricks as well, and the instrument's use is intuitive enough that I used the device a couple times before I even pulled out the instructions.

I bought this tracer to upgrade from the Greenlee that I've been using. This tracer takes a learning curve to get used to, but once you get the hang of it, the thing is fantastic to use. Here's what I love about it. First, it has a digital readout on the reciever that shows the intensity of the tracer signal that you're picking up, allowing you to really zero in on the breaker or wire that you're seeking. You can also increase or decrease the sensitivity of the reciever so that you can get into range of the signal and then close in on the precise location of the signal. Secondly, this thing can trace underground circuits! I've only tried a depth of 2' so far but it worked great. Another cool feature is the 20' accessory lead that can be used to connect to a separate grounding source for more accurate signal output. It's also durable and has a rugged carrying case. I highly recommend this product. This is the best tracer at this reasonable price!

Recently purchased this as I had to locate an underground wire run with a total length of 1,600 feet. Tried this tracer with power on and off, and I must say, it performed extremely well. It seems to have more strength with the power on, but was accurate enough with it off as well. My total wire run was 1,600 feet and approximately 12-18 inches for the majority of the run. I had to dig it up in multiple spots and was able to confirm accuracy, and if you're a contractor that will use this for any length of time, I believe you will learn some tricks with this tool, such as what your best signal strength setting are, etc. After that job, I did several others where I used it. In one instance, we were able to locate a wire that had been pulled out of a box during the construction phase and never reinstalled, and we were able to remove the nearby 1 gang box it was intended to be connected to and reach in and pull the wire out. In another example, I connected it to a set of floodlight wires because the homeowner did not know how to turn it on, and we found a hidden light switch behind some furniture, simply by tracing it along the wall. Super happy with the purchase, this tool stays in my van all the time, because I don't know when and where I will need to trace something out. Thank you Klein, excellent product at an excellent price! Just wish the hard case was more compact, no reason for it to be that large...

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This tool is a necessity for anyone working with electricity as it also works on live circuits. It will help you find hidden wires just about anywhere. One of the best cases was trying to find a ~20 year old buried cable outdoors where trees have grown up and the people that originally buried it must have been drunk because the line went in very odd multiple directions and power didn’t come out the other end about 300’ away. Turns out there was a buried splice in the ground about 1.5’ down where someone had spliced the line (went somewhere else into the back 40 🙄) only taped the connection (no marrets) and tried to encase it all in fiberglass 😂 I would never have found that without this tool. If you wanted to install lag bolts into a wall, the price of this tool for a one time use would be worth the cost to make sure a wire wasn’t in the way or you’d instantly be into more money to fix it if you needed to call an electrician to install a new wire.

Lo compre porque requiero un equipo que sea capaz de detectar y rastrear cables enterrados o en paredes, ademas de poder rastrear interruptores. Encontre este equipo, que si bien se puede utilizar para cosas caseras, por su precio y sensibilidad es mas bien para condiciones y trabajos comerciales o industriales. La sensibilidad es ajustable, pues como el generador de señal es muy potente, la señal puede difuminarse en interruptores o zonas adyacentes, pero para eso tiene un metodo de conexion que permite eliminar ligeramente la amplia distribucion de señal. El equipo se ve, se siente y tiene funciones avanzadas, es muy robusto, grande y a la vez facil de utilizar. Viene con varios accesorios para conectar el generador de señal a diferentes necesidades y su instructivo de uso es muy sencillo en caso que no hayas utilizado algun equipo similar. Lo que mas me gusto es que la potencia de señal es muy fuerte, tanto que pude rastrear cables hasta unos 50 cm de distancia y en otras condiciones hasta casi 1 metro. Lo que me gusto tambien es su robustes, es de uso rudo y de uso sencillo. Lo que no me gusto es la gran cantidad de baterias que utiliza, aunque lo usare con baterias recargables, viene con 10 baterias 2AA incluidas. Lo que no me gusto es que la sensibilidad sea ajustable manualmente y no de forma automatica segun se vaya acercando o alejando del rastreo objetivo. Pero en terminos generales estoy muy satisfecho con este equipo y definitivamente lo recomiendo.

Excellent meter, re-wiring and older house, original home owner did modification that would have taken days to trace. Able to find and trace wires quickly and accurately.

Excelente para buscar circuitos y lineas detras o bajo concreto, No decepciona, es algo que todo buen electricista debería de tener entre sus herramientas, hace el paro cañon ahorrando mucho tiempo en encontrar lineas.