House wiring rant

[aczlan]

Personally i never pigtail my #14 or #12 wires together during rough wiring, because invariably the mud monkey ,... er drywaller/... will cover a box. by leaving them uncoupled, i can use a tick tracer to find the offending missing box. (My best job to date had 34 missing boxes...including two 4 gang boxes... i should have shot that contractor).

I have seen a few buried boxes (including some where a house in a subdivision was roughed out by another contractor ~3 years earlier, never sold and someone bought it).
We spent a week in that house running wires for the other stuff the new owner wanted and finding lost boxes.
Not sure that kind of rotozip the drywaller was using on that job, but they nicked wires that were pushed into the back of a single gang deep box...

Aaron Z

 

[grsthegreat]

ya, i used to pigtail all my wires so that they were all ready for the devise come finish. Then the mud monkeys started doing piece work and not caring about burying boxes.

They were actually cleaning off their trowels in my boxes....

I found a way to curtail that, i left the outlet boxes live...and arced a few trowels. They got pissed...i told them quit filing my boxes. Got pretty nasty at times.

But then sanity prevailed and i went to not pigtailing them. There real easy to locate with signal tracer then. And i back charge the drywall contractor via the general contractor.

This method made the real difference. Money is a good motivator

 

[hr3]

In my neighborhood there's houses back to the 1600's that still have their first knob & tube wiring. In many ways it's more trouble free than modern wiring. I've never seen a problem with K&T caused by rodents which I've seen plenty of with romex. "modern wire" is cheaper to install thus it's what people are used to seeing. New isn't always better. MikeD74T

..

I agree with you Mike but,, the first K&T wireing was in the late 1800's.. The first street light was in 1876 and it was 1882 before the first Incandescent light bulb commercially available..

Hmm showing my age I guess...:laughing:

 

[om21braz]

They were actually cleaning off their trowels in my boxes....

I found a way to curtail that, i left the outlet boxes live...and arced a few trowels

That would be quite a "top of the morning to ya" wake-up call LOL!

 

[MikeD74T]

..

I agree with you Mike but,, the first K&T wireing was in the late 1800's.. The first street light was in 1876 and it was 1882 before the first Incandescent light bulb commercially available..

Hmm showing my age I guess...:laughing:

I didn't say they were wired in the 1600's but once wired have not again changed. MikeD74t

 

[radioman]

Every time a freind calls me up to help with thier wiring, I keep seeing horrible connections. 5-7 wires in one box, romex mixed with cloth, too many circuits on one breakers, 2 seperate breakers sharing one junction box and circuits :confused2: ...... I always end up rewiring things for them as I do not want it on my conscience when I leave.

I know, it suxs to be me as I dont make good money doing it for freinds.....

 

[patrick_g]

A friend built his house and did his own wiring. His switches broke the white wire, not the black wire. The building inspector saw it, noticed and commented on it and passed it. Some bad stuff out there sometimes. I did not hear about it until after the fact. I would have carried on a bit and strongly suggested wiring it to code.

I lived on a sailboat for 9 years. Early on when I was cleaning out the boat with scrub brush and water hose I turned off the main breaker so being a little wild with water shouldn't be dangerous. I had a dual burner electric hot plate for use in port to conserve alcohol stove fuel and for convenience. I reached out to move the hot plate from its place atop the range and SHAZAM!!! The ensuing shock catapulted me across the galley into the navigation station. It rebooted my system I'm tellin' you.

Howd it happn'? Main breaker was installed in neutral wire. It did break the circuit and everything stopped when breaker was off but all outlets still were hot and standing nearly ankle deep in water my body was used as an indicator of available electricity.

Trivial fix, just run hot wire (black) through breaker and let white (neutral) go unswitched.

As a youngster visiting relatives in rural Mississippi I was a bit skeptical of the old wiring systems with insulators as in above posted pix. Rooms often had one electric source, a light bulb socket dangling from the ceiling with typically several gadgets to permit extension cords for running radios etc. Pretty scary stuff.

...and in conclusion... not all old wiring was done by Rube Goldberg Electric Inc. Hotel Del Coronado on Coronado "Island" in San Diego was converted from gas lights to electric by Thomas Alva Edison (with help from his crew.)

Pat

 

[Wilky]

One word: OLD

Would you feel safe living in a house with 120 year old wiring? NOT ME.

Not really that old. Had a fellow engineer build a house back in the 70's the contractor put in knob and tube. As electrical Engineers we questioned that as being to code come to find out NEC still listed at the time K&T as being legal. And the Inspector passed it. (Pa.) I built at same time had the inspector tell be I couldn't use 20 amp breakers except in Kitchen. I had run 12 gage but his argument was 20 amp didn't protect extention cords. I wanted to tell him 15 didn't either but thought better of it after inspection replaced 15s with 20s. During the rough inspection he told my wife I must be and EE she said "yes Why?" his answer was all dump engineers run 12 gage wire in their houses. Got me hot under collar but felt better than to say anything wanted to get the wiring passed. That was 40 years ago still remember cann't let go I guess.
Wayne

 

[grsthegreat]

Its amazing how people get shocked in MODERN wired houses. If a person accidentally mis-wires a simple light fixture using the ridged clear wire of the light (neutral) and lands it to the hot side of the switch, the light will still work. But if a person was to unscrew a dead light bulb, while the fixture was still on ,and accidentally touch the threaded part of the lamp bulb while doing so...bamm ... 120 volts.

Its these little things that zap people.

 

[murphy1244]

Where the heck do you get green wire nuts??? Never heard of this, what code # is it???
Murph " Sparkey"

 

[grsthegreat]

Where the heck do you get green wire nuts??? Never heard of this, what code # is it???
Murph " Sparkey"

They do sell them. Theres a hole drilled in the cap also so one wire can be run full length to attach to the device. I kid you not.

I used to see them in commercial work mostly....but now days we all use crimps.

As for code...heck if i know. my code book is being used as an added height for a floor jack in my shop...bout time i found a use for that crap.

heres a shot
406.9(B) Grounding-Pole Identification. Grounding-type receptacles,
adapters, cord connections, and attachment plugs
shall have a means for connection of an equipment grounding
conductor to the grounding pole.

A terminal for connection to the grounding pole shall be
designated by one of the following:
(1) A green-colored hexagonal-headed or -shaped terminal
screw or nut, not readily removable.
(2) A green-colored pressure wire connector body (a wire
barrel).
(3) A similar green-colored connection device, in the case
of adapters. The grounding terminal of a grounding
adapter shall be a green-colored rigid ear, lug, or similar
device. The equipment grounding connection shall
be so designed that it cannot make contact with
current-carrying parts of the receptacle, adapter, or attachment
plug. The adapter shall be polarized.
(4) If the terminal for the equipment grounding conductor
is not visible, the conductor entrance hole shall be
marked with the word green or ground, the letters G or
GR, a grounding symbol, or otherwise identified by a
distinctive green color. If the terminal for the equipment
grounding conductor is readily removable, the
area adjacent to the terminal shall be similarly marked.

 

[chopped]

Search Results for green wire nuts at The Home Depot

 

[murphy1244]

They do sell them. Theres a hole drilled in the cap also so one wire can be run full length to attach to the device. I kid you not.

I used to see them in commercial work mostly....but now days we all use crimps.

As for code...heck if i know. my code book is being used as an added height for a floor jack in my shop...bout time i found a use for that crap.

heres a shot
406.9(B) Grounding-Pole Identification. Grounding-type receptacles,
adapters, cord connections, and attachment plugs
shall have a means for connection of an equipment grounding
conductor to the grounding pole.

A terminal for connection to the grounding pole shall be
designated by one of the following:
(1) A green-colored hexagonal-headed or -shaped terminal
screw or nut, not readily removable.
(2) A green-colored pressure wire connector body (a wire
barrel).
(3) A similar green-colored connection device, in the case
of adapters. The grounding terminal of a grounding
adapter shall be a green-colored rigid ear, lug, or similar
device. The equipment grounding connection shall
be so designed that it cannot make contact with
current-carrying parts of the receptacle, adapter, or attachment
plug. The adapter shall be polarized.
(4) If the terminal for the equipment grounding conductor
is not visible, the conductor entrance hole shall be
marked with the word green or ground, the letters G or
GR, a grounding symbol, or otherwise identified by a
distinctive green color. If the terminal for the equipment
grounding conductor is readily removable, the
area adjacent to the terminal shall be similarly marked.

Do the crimps have to be green too?

 

[buckeyefarmer]

All my grounds have green wire nuts, very common to find. Another common thing you see is too many wires in a box. Boxes have size ratings, and code dictates how many wires into a box.

 

[grsthegreat]

Do the crimps have to be green too?

No, but since their copper, they will turn to a nice Patena (green) as they age LOL

Like i said, everyone uses crimps.....the only time i ever seen green nuts was on a some commercial jobs.

 

[hr3]

Not "Everybody" uses crimps.. we use green wirenuts on all single gang boxes..much faster..

 

[murphy1244]

Well, Almost everybody.

 

[JDgreen227]

Not "Everybody" uses crimps.. we use green wirenuts on all single gang boxes..much faster..

I have never liked crimps myself, a huge PIB if you ever want to disconnect the ground wires. Much prefer the wirenuts and I think they give as secure a connection AND you have no worries about the ends of the ground wires nicking a hot wire or touching a hot terminal.

 

[Bird]

JD, What's so wrong with knob & tube wiring ???? MikeD74T

There may not be anything wrong with knob & tube wiring, as such. But about 30 years ago, I installed some ceiling fans in my parents' home. My grandfather bought that house in 1943, but it was built in 1922 and had that knob & tube wiring in the attic. And if you touched a wire, all the insulation just crumbled and fell off. Scary, to say the least.

 

[JDgreen227]

There may not be anything wrong with knob & tube wiring, as such. But about 30 years ago, I installed some ceiling fans in my parents' home. My grandfather bought that house in 1943, but it was built in 1922 and had that knob & tube wiring in the attic. And if you touched a wire, all the insulation just crumbled and fell off. Scary, to say the least.

Still, as long as you don't touch the wiring after the insulation falls off, and it doesn't touch anything flammable, it's perfectly safe....:laughing: