OT: Electrical plug question

[Clare Snyder]

I have repeatedly qualified my statements,and you have repeatedly insisted on being a jerk about it. Says a lot more about you than me. No all caps. No extra punctuation marks. No spelling mistakes. No high blood pressure.

And from you, no admission that the typical house with knob and tube wiring would be virtually uninsurable most anywhere in the USA or Canada.(particularly any house that would be purchased for cash) In most cases these houses would be bought by those who cannot afford anything better, so would be unlikely to have the cash to buy them outright - and if the price was low enough for that typical buyer to pay cash, in all likelihood the condition of the house and it's wiring would not meet the requirements of most if not all insurers in the north American market to qualify for insurance. Also in most cases the cost of rewiring would be less than the cost of bringing the old wiring up to standard, if that would even be possible and allowed under either national or local code requirements

- whichever applied.

I think I qualified all of my statements adequately and have nothing to apologize for

You want to be a jerk about it, fine, go ahead - I don't know what you think you are gaining by it. Being the schoolyard bully doesn't gain you any stature and it isn't helping anyone else on the newsgroup either.

Have a happy new year (or a grouchy one if THAT makes you happy.)

(mandatory all caps included for your enjoyment)

[Clare Snyder]

That DOES let you trace the power - sort of - when the circuit does not have a problem - but does not do a good job of tracing neutrals. When not in a conduit a "fox and hound" tracer works but they are almost useless in a metal conduit. Generally finding what is ON a circuit isn't too much of a problem. Finding what circuit it is SUPPOSED to be on when it has "fallen off" for some reason is the fun part - in a building with 4 panels in it, where there appears to be no rhyme or reason to what is on what panel.

One building in particular - where I spent a LOT of time was built as a 4 unit commercial building which was developed as the office headquarters of a notorious financial planning fraudster locally (and foreclosed on before he opened the doors for business) was then redeveloped as the offices of the insurance company that was my major client for 17 years. Lots of changes were made by the developer. Then more changes were made as time went on - and I ended up trobleshooting a lot of issues. A real pain in the butt!! Complicating matters was the way some of the creditors removed equipment that was unpaid for when they came back to reclaim it - - - - - - (from the original tennant.)

[krw]

My son's house?

The kid's house has been modified with a "new" panel but it's half Romex and half K&T, so the K&T has been "upgraded".

But it happens. There is no requirement for grounded outlets in existing structures (grand fathered). There may be a requirement to mark them as ungrounded and/or put a GFCI on the circuit.

No boxes[*] in the ceiling of the kid's joint. I didn't much like it either but that's that.

Kid just bought the joint two years ago.

The light over the vanity in my VT house had no box either. In fact the romex came up one stud bay, then crossed over a stud, through a notch cut in the sheetrock into the next bay where it was fished through the metal fixture. No bonding to the fixture, no strain relief, no insulation protection at all. The house was built in '85 and this was original wiring. Retarded electricians aren't rare.

[Markem]

So no matter what I come up with you are going to trash the idea, right?

[Clare Snyder]

No. There are many devices that can be used to make tracing and troubleshooting individual conductor circuits in conduit and raceway easier - but NOTHING will make it as simple as following cable.

[Markem]

I have found just following the cable simple way to figure out where the conduit runs. Unless you have a situation where you should just tear it out and start over because of others incompetence.

[Clare Snyder]

Picture if you will a 300 foot building with 4 panels,160 circuits, and something in excess of 600 outlets, with the wiring running in conduits above a 12 - 15 foot suspended ceiling that has been renovated 3 times in 10 years. Over a mile of that wire was installed by myself - and none of THAT caused problems other than finding where the unused circuits had been dead-ended to get my power. THAT was fun - - - -

[Clare Snyder]

Follow what cable? The wires run through conduit from the panel to the outlet - through numerous "pull boxes" through a virtual GRID of conduit.

[J. Clarke]

How do you "follow the cable" when the "cable" is multiple independent wires pulled through a steel pipe?

[Markem]

Honest questions, was the price per foot below the market, when all the problem addressed was the cost still below market?

Fun can also be trying to pull wires through a conduit that was not sealed in a light weight concrete floor, then you pull the drywall down and reroute.

[Markem]

If you put the tracer on the hot lead you can follow it at the outlet and switch boxes, conduit does not act like a faraday cage.

[J. Clarke]

In conduit that only tells you where the "hot lead" is going. You seem to have the impression that the normal procedure is to pull multiconductor cable through conduit. That is something that is sometimes done where a multiconductor cable has to pass through an exposed area and needs protection, but the norm is separate, independent conductors.

[Just Wondering]

GUARD #1: Halt! Who goes there?

ARTHUR: It is I, Arthur, son of Uther Pendragon, from the castle of Camelot. King of the Britons, defeator of the Saxons, sovereign of all England!

GUARD #1: Pull the other one!

ARTHUR: I am. And this my trusty servant Patsy. We have ridden the length and breadth of the land in search of knights who will join me in my court at Camelot. I must speak with your lord and master.

GUARD #1: What, ridden on a horse?

ARTHUR: Yes!

GUARD #1: You're using coconuts!

ARTHUR: What?

GUARD #1: You've got two empty halves of coconut and you're bangin' 'em together.

ARTHUR: So? We have ridden since the snows of winter covered this land, through the kingdom of Mercea, through...

GUARD #1: Where'd you get the coconut?

ARTHUR: We found them.

GUARD #1: Found them? In Mercea? The coconut's tropical!

ARTHUR: What do you mean?

GUARD #1: Well, this is a temperate zone.

ARTHUR: The swallow may fly south with the sun or the house martin or the plumber may seek warmer climes in winter yet these are not strangers to our land.

GUARD #1: Are you suggesting coconuts migrate?

ARTHUR: Not at all, they could be carried.

GUARD #1: What, a swallow carrying a coconut?

ARTHUR: It could grip it by the husk!

GUARD #1: It's not a question of where he grips it! It's a simple question of weight ratios! A five ounce bird could not carry a one pound coconut.

ARTHUR: Well, it doesn't matter. Will you go and tell your master that Arthur from the Court of Camelot is here.

GUARD #1: Listen, in order to maintain air-speed velocity, a swallow needs to beat its wings 43 times every second, right?

ARTHUR: Please!

GUARD #1: Am I right?

ARTHUR: I'm not interested!

GUARD #2: It could be carried by an African swallow!

GUARD #1: Oh, yeah, an African swallow maybe, but not a European swallow, that's my point.

GUARD #2: Oh, yeah, I agree with that.

ARTHUR: Will you ask your master if he wants to join my court at Camelot?!

GUARD #1: But then of course African swallows are not migratory.

GUARD #2: Oh, yeah.

GUARD #1: So they couldn't bring a coconut back anyway... [clop clop]

GUARD #2: Wait a minute -- supposing two swallows carried it together?

GUARD #1: No, they'd have to have it on a line.

GUARD #2: Well, simple! They'd just use a strand of creeper!

GUARD #1: What, held under the dorsal guiding feathers?

GUARD #2: Well, why not?

[Markem]

In house wiring. You are over thinking it.

[J. Clarke]

Conduit is not the norm in house wiring.

[Markem]

Was where I grew up.

[Puckdropper]

Markem wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Chicago?

[Clare Snyder]

On Tue, 31 Dec 2019 17:04:33 -0600, Markem wrote:

DEFINITELY. There was over 3 million dollars of leasehold improvements done to the building by the previous tennant (who never got to occupy the bulding due to his fraud) and we spent only $60,000 in renovations to make it suitable for our use - and we leased it for the same price as if it was bare walls. No question it was the deal of the century. I pulled out over 1800 feet of co-ax and re-routed a lot of cat5. Had to sort out all the cat5 too, because when the supplier of the server came to take away their equipment they cut all the cat5 cable off about 3 feet from the ceiling above the door to the server room. I had to identify and re-terminate 128 network cables - and some were terminated 568A and some were 568B - no rhymr or reason. Then I had to hang a rack above the door for the network switches anc connect all the IT system cables to one pair of switches and all the IP Phone cables to another pair of switches.

Then we converted the theatre portion to office space - putting a trench in the concrete floor for a sequestered raceway where we pulled several miles of cat 5 cable and power cables for the workstations on the main floor as well as on the raised poertion (was stepped theatre seating - we removed about half of the rizers - which were built solid enough you could have parked at least a D9 on them). I had to get wiring fot 6 workstations into the rizer area which was 2 layers of

3/4 inch plywood screwed and glued to a framework of laminated 2X material - double thickness - running ACROSS the floor on 16 inch centers. I had to drill through 12 feet and pull 3 circuits of BX plus 12 cat5 cables into stage boxes located 6 and 12 feet in. Made my own extendable 2 1/2 inch drill bit using half inch galvanized water pipe and a forstner bit - pulling in a fish cord with the drill when I pulled it out -and then pulling in the cables. All those cables to the trench raceway had to be pulled through 2 2 inch conduits - one for power and one for data- over a 15 foot ceiling from the server room and power panel - and all the power circuits had to be repurposed from the stage lighting and stage power circuits. 8 power circuits in the trench plus the 6 on the rizer. There wer 8 "split" floor receptacles and 8 more of the floor boxes with 16 data cables fastened to the steel decking of the trench box. That was what "I" was involved with on the primary renovation. As space was repurposed over the next 7 years I had to relocate and repurpose and add circuits - poth power and data - throughout the building. Adding those circuits was the most fun - as there were dead-headed circuits all over the place from "features" that were removed in the first renovation - and finding where those wires were was a major pain in the ASS. I'd find a junction box with nutted off cables in it - then have to find what panel they were connected to, and what breaker, orWHERE they had been disconnected further forward in the circuit and if they had already been repurposed at that point - and what all was on the circuit to know if I could add the additional required load/outlet - and whether it was switched somewhere or not. You would not believe how many crossed neutrals I uncovered!!!!! the neutral for the circuit running to one panel, and the line to another - ond with a 3 phase feed.

Then the HVAC system - what a mishmash. 4 rooftop units. controlled from 3 controller locations and 6 thermostatrs - with zoning - and the control for the north end unit in the middle of the building, and the control for the center unit about 15 feet farther north - you get the picture????

The eaziest part was tracing the cat 5 - because it wasn't pulled through conduit. And yes - I had fox and hound, and I had network tracers (cable analysers) - and numerous other "toys" including a modified Tyco RC truck that I ran across the suspended ceiling to pull fish ropes for pulling in data cables - - - - Took a bit of concentration to run the little beggar in reverse for 200 feet dodging the hangar wires- had to have the drive wheels at the front to crawl over the "T" bars. I'd get it stuck. pull it back a bit with tnhe fiash cable and give it another try 'till it would drop through the opening in the ceiling at the other end (where I had removed a tile)

THAT was a LOT easier than pulling extra wire into an already half full conduit and we resorted to using it to pull in AC cable (BX) on occaision when there was no available power circuit in the conduit where it was required.

[Clare Snyder]

Except for outlets located IN the floor - both data and power, EVERYTHING was fed from above, through conduit in either steel stud or concrete block walls.. Fun getting additional conduit down into the steel stud walls was remedied by dropping armoured cable instead for power.

[Clare Snyder]

Tell that to the hound trying to "follow" the fox!!!! Yes - if you could find the end of the wire you could confirm it was the end of that wire - most of the time - but crosstalk could make a parallel wire indicate as well. - just like plugging the breaker detector into an outlet then going back with the sniffer to figure out which breaker it was on ---- You could narrow it down to one of 3 breakers most often - then by turning them off and on pin down which one was your target - - -