Sunday, July 18, 2010
Homeowner frightfest: Handy Jack Strikes again...
I am endlessly amazed at the messes people get into because someone hires a hack to do their electrical work!
Electricity KILLS! IT IS FIRE IN A BOX!
Question:
While doing some remodel in the attic I came across a thick wire that I needed to reroute just a few inches. When I pulled on it to see how much give it had, it came loose from behind the wall. I think it's part of the old electrical system. I followed the part that came loose to the attic crawl space where it is split, partly into an old style tube & knob system. The house definitely has new wiring so I think this old stuff is not hot. But I'm concerned that there is something hot behind the wall where it pulled a apart and I have no way of reaching. What's the likelihood of there being an old hot wire that is now loose? I think that they just didn't take the old stuff out when they put the new wiring in and I just pulled out some old loose not hot connection. But now I'm worried about that there might be a hot wire that I pulled loose. DO I have reason to worry?
Answer:
Whether you have any reason to worry is a reasonable question under the circumstances.
You won't like the answer, but yes ..... and no.
Yes, because there is always the possibility that the conductor may be part of an active system and your action may have exposed some hitherto inert wiring as a hazard.
No, because your observation that the house has been largely rewired makes this unlikely.
Never the less, you have a job of work ahead of you. You get the fun task left to you by my favorite worker, Handy Jack. "Handy Jack" is my less than affectionate moniker for the representative of that class of morons who think that they have "discovered" a newer simpler solution to an electrical condition that is so much more reasonable than the process followed by the literally millions of obvious idiots working in the electrical trades, including construction, engineering, design and manufacturing and possessing the combined knowledge derived from tens, if not hundreds, of BILLIONS [I am an electrician, not a mathematician. There are roughly 600,000 electricians who clock 2,000 to 3,000 working hours each year and have, in increasing numbers, for the past 100 years!] of hours of exposure to, and contemplation of, the safe and useful application of electrical energy as we understand it.
Jack, of course, can see clearly where we have all overlooked the apparent, simple solution....
[BTW-Handy Jack also does plumbing, carpentry, roofing and siding, replacement window installation, auto repairs and brain surgery...]
Now, to YOUR problem.
The likely condition is that the lazy louts who modified your wiring elected to simply abandon the existing knob and tube components and leave it in place, even though the National Electrical Code requires abandoned conductors and equipment to be removed where accessible. The attic wiring was accessible and should have been demolished if it had been abandoned. This would have caused the tail you found to be removed.
Is the outer covering of this "thick wire" composed of fabric [called loom] and does it have a single cloth and/or rubber insulated conductor, like the exposed K&T wiring, inside?
If so, what you describe sounds like standard K&T wiring.
If you care to learn about knob and tube wiring methods, you will find that it was allowable to transition to this method for an extension to a device like a switch or receptacle, and that the loom material was used to protect the conductor all the way into the device box. This being the case, the likely scenario is that my friend Jack probably just eliminated the old device and left the loom and conductor floating in the wall when he ran new wire. [If you consider the length of the free conductor you discovered, you may find that it would just about reach the location of some newer device]
You are now paying what the cheapskate saved when he hired Jack to rewire his house. You see, people never understand why a competent electrician wants so much money when they can get the job done for half the price, or why they should pay for a permit and an electrical inspection. Jack just didn't include the labor cost to complete the job properly in his bargain price and wasn't going to work for free.
What is true is that this wiring method is not the kind of installation to be interfered with and disabled by such a casual manipulation of a component as you describe.
This is the good news, and the most likely case.
The bad news is that you don't know that for certain.
Is there anything which has stopped working? You know the probable cause.
No problems? Great! You now just have to prove to your satisfaction that the K&T components you discovered were inert before your "accident."
Make sure the K&T segment you discovered attached to the whip is not active and supplied from anywhere, or serving as the neutral for something.
Make sure the whip didn't reach anything that could have been providing a hot or neutral path.
If you are not sufficiently skilled to undertake the process of alleviating your concerns about the discovered wiring, hire a professional electrician to resolve the matter .... or buy extra smoke detectors and make sure your fire insurance is paid up. I am not concerned about your safety, because I sure wouldn't sleep well until I knew what the story was ... and I doubt you will either.
Electricity KILLS! IT IS FIRE IN A BOX!
Question:
While doing some remodel in the attic I came across a thick wire that I needed to reroute just a few inches. When I pulled on it to see how much give it had, it came loose from behind the wall. I think it's part of the old electrical system. I followed the part that came loose to the attic crawl space where it is split, partly into an old style tube & knob system. The house definitely has new wiring so I think this old stuff is not hot. But I'm concerned that there is something hot behind the wall where it pulled a apart and I have no way of reaching. What's the likelihood of there being an old hot wire that is now loose? I think that they just didn't take the old stuff out when they put the new wiring in and I just pulled out some old loose not hot connection. But now I'm worried about that there might be a hot wire that I pulled loose. DO I have reason to worry?
Answer:
Whether you have any reason to worry is a reasonable question under the circumstances.
You won't like the answer, but yes ..... and no.
Yes, because there is always the possibility that the conductor may be part of an active system and your action may have exposed some hitherto inert wiring as a hazard.
No, because your observation that the house has been largely rewired makes this unlikely.
Never the less, you have a job of work ahead of you. You get the fun task left to you by my favorite worker, Handy Jack. "Handy Jack" is my less than affectionate moniker for the representative of that class of morons who think that they have "discovered" a newer simpler solution to an electrical condition that is so much more reasonable than the process followed by the literally millions of obvious idiots working in the electrical trades, including construction, engineering, design and manufacturing and possessing the combined knowledge derived from tens, if not hundreds, of BILLIONS [I am an electrician, not a mathematician. There are roughly 600,000 electricians who clock 2,000 to 3,000 working hours each year and have, in increasing numbers, for the past 100 years!] of hours of exposure to, and contemplation of, the safe and useful application of electrical energy as we understand it.
Jack, of course, can see clearly where we have all overlooked the apparent, simple solution....
[BTW-Handy Jack also does plumbing, carpentry, roofing and siding, replacement window installation, auto repairs and brain surgery...]
Now, to YOUR problem.
The likely condition is that the lazy louts who modified your wiring elected to simply abandon the existing knob and tube components and leave it in place, even though the National Electrical Code requires abandoned conductors and equipment to be removed where accessible. The attic wiring was accessible and should have been demolished if it had been abandoned. This would have caused the tail you found to be removed.
Is the outer covering of this "thick wire" composed of fabric [called loom] and does it have a single cloth and/or rubber insulated conductor, like the exposed K&T wiring, inside?
If so, what you describe sounds like standard K&T wiring.
If you care to learn about knob and tube wiring methods, you will find that it was allowable to transition to this method for an extension to a device like a switch or receptacle, and that the loom material was used to protect the conductor all the way into the device box. This being the case, the likely scenario is that my friend Jack probably just eliminated the old device and left the loom and conductor floating in the wall when he ran new wire. [If you consider the length of the free conductor you discovered, you may find that it would just about reach the location of some newer device]
You are now paying what the cheapskate saved when he hired Jack to rewire his house. You see, people never understand why a competent electrician wants so much money when they can get the job done for half the price, or why they should pay for a permit and an electrical inspection. Jack just didn't include the labor cost to complete the job properly in his bargain price and wasn't going to work for free.
What is true is that this wiring method is not the kind of installation to be interfered with and disabled by such a casual manipulation of a component as you describe.
This is the good news, and the most likely case.
The bad news is that you don't know that for certain.
Is there anything which has stopped working? You know the probable cause.
No problems? Great! You now just have to prove to your satisfaction that the K&T components you discovered were inert before your "accident."
Make sure the K&T segment you discovered attached to the whip is not active and supplied from anywhere, or serving as the neutral for something.
Make sure the whip didn't reach anything that could have been providing a hot or neutral path.
If you are not sufficiently skilled to undertake the process of alleviating your concerns about the discovered wiring, hire a professional electrician to resolve the matter .... or buy extra smoke detectors and make sure your fire insurance is paid up. I am not concerned about your safety, because I sure wouldn't sleep well until I knew what the story was ... and I doubt you will either.
# posted by Bob @ 7:59 AM 
