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SpartanIvy posted:The one complaint I have so far is I popped the breaker panel off for the above picture, and I can't seem to get it screwed back on right. The left side of breakers is too far left for it to sit flush against them, as you can see in the picture below. Oddly enough, the right side of the breakers fit perfectly in the pop-outs. Should I just take an angle grinder to the plate and knock an 1/8" off the side of the cutouts, or is this a serious issue of some sort I should ask the electrician about. Before I popped it out to inspect it, the breakers were somehow inside the cutouts, but I have tried warping and manhandling the plate and breakers a decent amount (after I cut the main power off) and I cannot get them to fit. Umm. No. It was right before you took it off, so you know that it can go on there correctly. Take it all the way off and put it back on very carefully. Figure out where it's binding. Do not just angle-grind away the cutouts.
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Mar 31, 2021 03:12
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SpartanIvy posted:Should I just take an angle grinder to the plate and knock an 1/8" off the side of the cutouts, or is this a serious issue of some sort I should ask the electrician about. Before I popped it out to inspect it, the breakers were somehow inside the cutouts, but I have tried warping and manhandling the plate and breakers a decent amount (after I cut the main power off) and I cannot get them to fit. Dear god no. You see how they fit perfectly before you took it off? They should look the same when you put it back on, you probably knocked one side a little loose, teypushing them back toward center.
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Mar 31, 2021 03:15
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Jesus no. How about hiring an electrician instead of hacking at it yourself.
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Mar 31, 2021 03:25
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I was very careful taking the cover off so I doubt I loosened anything. Regardless, I tried pushing the breakers towards the center to get it to pop on with no luck. I'll give it another try tomorrow morning. There were already marks in those spots from when the electrician installed it, so it at least seems like an issue he had too. Every other panel I've ever inspected just popped off and right back on without any issues. 
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Mar 31, 2021 03:27
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sharkytm posted:Jesus no. How about hiring an electrician instead of hacking at it yourself. 
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Mar 31, 2021 03:30
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You guys made me think I was crazy so I went out and messed with it again and there's definitely something off. I was able to get it to set flush after going breaker by breaker and pushing them with considerable force to the right and past the edge of the cover. It's definitely not how I think it should be so I'll reach back out to my electrician tomorrow, but it appears to be how it was before. SpartanIvy fucked around with this message at 03:47 on Mar 31, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 03:45
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SpartanIvy posted:You guys made me think I was crazy so I went out and messed with it again and there's definitely something off. I was able to get it to set flush after going breaker by breaker and pushing them with considerable force to the right and past the edge of the cover. Yeah. My subpanel was like that. Something isn't seated right or a knockout didn't knockout enough. Reseating some breakers with considerable "I am done loving with this" force towards the center line helped. Either way if they installed it literally today and it's messed up they should come back around to fix it this week. When is your inspection?
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Mar 31, 2021 03:48
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SpartanIvy posted:I was able to get it to set flush after going breaker by breaker and pushing them with considerable force to the right and past the edge of the cover. Was just getting ready to chime in to say basically this. HOM panels are notorious for this in my experience. Even when the enclosure isn't slightly warped due to an uneven mounting surface, it can take a little work. A little gentle in and (edit) right pressure on the left hand breakers/handles and a firm right hand on the center-outside of the enclosure pushing inward does the trick (with the cover screws a bit less than tight). It's normal, especially as I don't see any real warping in the pictured enclosure. edit2x: also the inner part of the breakers go "home" a little more than one might think and a lack of getting them in all the way (a very small amount) will make the cover harder to install just like the situation you've described. Blackbeer fucked around with this message at 04:11 on Mar 31, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 03:54
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H110Hawk posted:Yeah. My subpanel was like that. Something isn't seated right or a knockout didn't knockout enough. Reseating some breakers with considerable "I am done loving with this" force towards the center line helped. Either way if they installed it literally today and it's messed up they should come back around to fix it this week. When is your inspection? It was already "inspected". Get this though: the city asked my electrician to text them pictures of everything, which he did, and they approved it that way. So the city inspector would have no way of telling if the cover was too tight or anything, merely that it looked correct. I know that all sounds incredibly suspicious but I verified permits were filed and the electricity provider wouldn't turn my power back on or hook up my meter if they didn't have a clearance from the city inspector in their system. I'd say this was a COVID thing but my electrician seemed surprised by it too. edit: I should point out my electrician is licensed master electrician that came recommended to me from another master electrician I know, but who only does commercial work. I'm confident he's on the up-and-up and the city probably knows him too which might partly explain their fast-and-loose inspection. I did not cheap out or hire some Home Depot moron. Blackbeer posted:Was just getting ready to chime in to say basically this. HOM panels are notorious for this in my experience. Even when the enclosure isn't slightly warped due to an uneven mounting surface, it can take a little work. A little gentle in and left pressure on the left hand breakers/handles and a firm right hand on the center-outside of the enclosure pushing inward does the trick (with the cover screws a bit less than tight). It's normal, especially as I don't see any real warping in the pictured enclosure. I found a video on youtube of an electrician installing a HOM panel and it looked like his panel had the exact same issue mine has but then after struggling for a few seconds he jump cuts to it installed without any explanation. Good to know it's probably a common issue. My house is old and nothing is flat or square on it. I thought it might be due to warping because the latch is a little sticky when opening it, but it didn't feel warped enough to be causing this much of an issue. edit 2: I guess I should toss in a "fun" story from the install. So prior to this my house was on the original 1950 fuse box for the interior of the house, and there was a subpanel wired in parallel with the fuse panel at some point in the long forgotten past that ran the electric clothes dryer, 120v blower/gas furnace, and A/C condenser. I've never touched it because there is no way to cut power to it other than pulling the meter. Well the guy opens it up and only finds one set of 10 gauge wires going out of it and they're going to the A/C. However the wire going through the crawl space and to the dryer is definitely 10 gauge. What the hell? So he cuts open the wall between the box and the crawl space and finds out that the last guy spliced the 10 gauge romex to a 12 gauge romex for the last 3 feet or so of travel to the box. As a cherry on top it was all hidden behind sheetrock. As far as I can tell it was that way since about the 80's. It's crazy this house never burned down. SpartanIvy fucked around with this message at 04:15 on Mar 31, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 03:55
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I guess the bottom line imo is that you're ok as HOM panels are a substantially less expensive and this is the kind of thing you get. I install HOM panels often and am not saying you should be worried or anything, but having trouble getting the cover to fit easily is kind of generally indicative of the panel line. Wouldn't worry about it as any pressure you've applied to the breakers wouldn't threaten the integrity of the bus bar/mounting brackets or anything. The installation overall looks good to me; lug covers on, enclosure bonded, surge suppressor, as neat as a replacement gets wrt the branch circuit wiring. I guess if I had to nitpick I'd say that the panel is level with the world instead of the meter enclosure/siding, the liquid-tight conduit in the upper right is maybe overfilled, and there doesn't seem to be two earth ground bonding methods (don't think this would be actually required with this job, but something you could add on down the road). Technically the wires in that upper right flex conduit are probably not rated for damp location, but even my rear end in a top hat inspector would let it pass given that the homeowner is making things safer overall, and fixing an awning-protected 2' run is nowhere worth the price in a case like this. edit: also, I've been texting photos to my inspector during COVID. They put off inspections where they have to go in a home, but I've gotten a few done where a photo or two would cover their end. Blackbeer fucked around with this message at 04:30 on Mar 31, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 04:25
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SpartanIvy posted:It was already "inspected". Fun! Also that seems like as much inspection as you would get in person for a panel r&r. Maybe some jiggling. If your guy has done other stuff in the city and it's all passed then your inspector probably trusts them not to be a chucklehead. As the other poster mentioned, it looks pretty clean for rework without pulling all new wire, and now you don't have mystery splices.
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Mar 31, 2021 04:39
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Can confirm that having to push the breakers in like that to get the cover lined up is just HOM things, all the cheapy 1" breaker panels do it to a greater or lesser extent.
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Mar 31, 2021 04:48
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Blackbeer posted:I guess the bottom line imo is that you're ok as HOM panels are a substantially less expensive and this is the kind of thing you get. I install HOM panels often and am not saying you should be worried or anything, but having trouble getting the cover to fit easily is kind of generally indicative of the panel line. Wouldn't worry about it as any pressure you've applied to the breakers wouldn't threaten the integrity of the bus bar/mounting brackets or anything. Blackbeer posted:The installation overall looks good to me; lug covers on, enclosure bonded, surge suppressor, as neat as a replacement gets wrt the branch circuit wiring. I guess if I had to nitpick I'd say that the panel is level with the world instead of the meter enclosure/siding, the liquid-tight conduit in the upper right is maybe overfilled, and there doesn't seem to be two earth ground bonding methods (don't think this would be actually required with this job, but something you could add on down the road). Technically the wires in that upper right flex conduit are probably not rated for damp location, but even my rear end in a top hat inspector would let it pass given that the homeowner is making things safer overall, and fixing an awning-protected 2' run is nowhere worth the price in a case like this. He did mention that two earth grounds is a good idea, and that the city either wants a water pipe used as a ground or something like a coil of copper buried 8 feet away(I am probably mis-interpreting the correct thing he told me). I can't do the water pipe option because I'm using PEX, and my yard is not easily conducive to burying things because of a bunch of giant trees and their roots. He also said it wasn't really required for this job so we decided to forgo it. I do have 2 grounding rods that are 8' apart, but they are both on the same wire. I don't know a ton about conduit fill, so your wisdom on that is good to hear. I will be researching it more in the future because I think the best way to add more circuits to this panel would be to run THWN wire through conduit out the bottom and then through brick into my crawl space. Seems like every existing conduit is pretty much filled to capacity as is. Blackbeer posted:edit: also, I've been texting photos to my inspector during COVID. They put off inspections where they have to go in a home, but I've gotten a few done where a photo or two would cover their end. H110Hawk posted:Fun! Thanks for the feedback everyone. Even if I sometimes get dog piled on for suggesting stupid things, I appreciate being made fun of and I'll sleep a little better tonight knowing that I probably won't burn to death from fidgeting with the panel cover.
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Mar 31, 2021 05:13
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SpartanIvy posted:It's still crazy to me but my only other experience was when they came to inspect my water heater install and the guy literally glanced at the water heater and marked it as good, so maybe my inspection expectations are just too high. That's all it takes to check if it's installed to code or not if you know what you're looking for.
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Mar 31, 2021 13:52
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Motronic posted:That's all it takes to check if it's installed to code or not if you know what you're looking for. He wouldn't have caught the old TPR drain line in the crawl space that was so wrong as to be non functioning or if there was inadequate replacement air where the combustion air intake was in the attic. No matter how good you are, you can't see issues you don't actually see.
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Mar 31, 2021 16:22
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SpartanIvy posted:He wouldn't have caught the old TPR drain line in the crawl space that was so wrong as to be non functioning or if there was inadequate replacement air where the combustion air intake was in the attic. Obviously not every situation is the same but it's entirely possible to see every last thing that needs to be inspected on a water heat install from 10 feet away if it's an install without something like that, which you didn't mention......you just seemed to not understand that this was possible.
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Mar 31, 2021 16:45
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Need some help on a ceiling fan I just installed. The previous fan was hooked up to two dimmer switches, one for the fan and one for the light. My new fan has an LED light that was not working with the dimmers, and the fan is not really meant to work with a dimmer switch either, so I swapped out the dimmers for regular switches. The issue I'm having is that it looks like I wired the new switches in series because now my light will only work if the fan switch is also on. This was not the case before where I could turn the fan and light on separately. This is a picture of the dimmer switches before I removed them.  Here's a quick and dirty diagram of it.  I didn't take a picture of the fan wiring unfortunately, but I did have a red, black, and white wire in the ceiling box. I connected the red wire to the light and the black wire to the fan, and the white to both. Now I know normally I would not wire the neutral to the switch, it would be hot in and out, but the old dimmer switches did have the neutral wired to them. Maybe the white wire to the switches is not really a neutral? I'm trying to figure out how to get the fan and light switched separately. Any help?
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Mar 31, 2021 20:39
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Bird in a Blender posted:Need some help on a ceiling fan I just installed. The previous fan was hooked up to two dimmer switches, one for the fan and one for the light. My new fan has an LED light that was not working with the dimmers, and the fan is not really meant to work with a dimmer switch either, so I swapped out the dimmers for regular switches. The issue I'm having is that it looks like I wired the new switches in series because now my light will only work if the fan switch is also on. This was not the case before where I could turn the fan and light on separately. lol switch loop. White coming in the box is hot. Black is the fan or the light, red is the other one. So pigtail the white one and put it on both switches, then hook the black up to one switch and the red up to the other - this is exactly as it is in the picture you took of the old dimmers.
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Mar 31, 2021 20:48
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Motronic posted:lol switch loop. Well that is how I wired it up, but it's not working the same. Maybe I screwed it up at the fan.
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Mar 31, 2021 20:55
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Bird in a Blender posted:Well that is how I wired it up, but it's not working the same. Maybe I screwed it up at the fan. Okay, so at the fan what you should have is a piece of romex with a white and black that is always on. The neutral on that should be attached to the neutral of the fan/light and the hot should be attached to the white line of the piece of romex heading towards your switchbox, which should be obvious because that romex is gonna have a red in it also. The red and black from that same romex run should be attached individually to the fan and the other to the light.
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Mar 31, 2021 20:58
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I did a job the other day cleaning up the wiring in an attic after a wall was removed and beam added. Original house wiring is aluminum and the panel is PFE (yikes). I used purple wirenuts for all my junctions but I got to wondering, is there a wire nut rated for Al-Al connections? Purps and alumiconns only mention Al-Cu. What product do you guys use? Also yes I'm going to push for a service change because of the FPE panel. I'm surprised she can get insured tbh
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Mar 31, 2021 21:46
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Motronic posted:Okay, so at the fan what you should have is a piece of romex with a white and black that is always on. The neutral on that should be attached to the neutral of the fan/light and the hot should be attached to the white line of the piece of romex heading towards your switchbox, which should be obvious because that romex is gonna have a red in it also. The red and black from that same romex run should be attached individually to the fan and the other to the light. As far as I can tell, everything is wired correctly in the wall box and at the fan. I’ll have to see if there’s something internal to the fan making this happen. It comes with a remote, so for the time being I can leave the fan switch on all the time and turn the light on/off. Once I need the fan I can use the remote to turn it on.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:22
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Rufio posted:I did a job the other day cleaning up the wiring in an attic after a wall was removed and beam added. Original house wiring is aluminum and the panel is PFE (yikes). I used purple wirenuts for all my junctions but I got to wondering, is there a wire nut rated for Al-Al connections? Purps and alumiconns only mention Al-Cu. What product do you guys use? I'm surprised you would take that job. If her house burns down is there any risk she could blame it on your work, even if it was from the FPE breaker or bad aluminum wiring?
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Mar 31, 2021 23:23
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Bird in a Blender posted:As far as I can tell, everything is wired correctly in the wall box and at the fan. I’ll have to see if there’s something internal to the fan making this happen. It comes with a remote, so for the time being I can leave the fan switch on all the time and turn the light on/off. Once I need the fan I can use the remote to turn it on. So if you wire nut all three things together (white. black, red) in the switch box that should give you an always-on fan/light to be controlled with the remote if your wiring up in the fan box is right and the fan actually works. Might be a good diagnostic step.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:29
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SpartanIvy posted:I'm surprised you would take that job. If her house burns down is there any risk she could blame it on your work, even if it was from the FPE breaker or bad aluminum wiring? It's a friend of my wife, so I'm not worried about it. I'm thinking she's going to end up doing the service change if not a full rewire but she can't afford it right this moment.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:31
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Rufio posted:I did a job the other day cleaning up the wiring in an attic after a wall was removed and beam added. Original house wiring is aluminum and the panel is PFE (yikes). I used purple wirenuts for all my junctions but I got to wondering, is there a wire nut rated for Al-Al connections? Purps and alumiconns only mention Al-Cu. What product do you guys use? Anything that can do Al-Cu can do Al-Al or Cu-Cu. That being said, the only time I touch aluminum under like #1 is to rip it out and replace it with copper. I know those purple wire nuts are rated, but I don't trust them, too many anecdotes about finding them melted from other electricians. Isn't there a terminal-strip like product out now for Al-Cu connnections? That seems a lot better. Bird in a Blender posted:Well that is how I wired it up, but it's not working the same. Maybe I screwed it up at the fan. Post pictures of your wiring in the switch box and fan so we can help.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:36
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Elviscat posted:Isn't there a terminal-strip like product out now for Al-Cu connnections? That seems a lot better. PDF warning..... https://www.kinginnovation.com/pics/db/docs/59-5010046AWAlumiConnREVN.pdf This is what I prefer to see/use. With liberal use of noalox.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:40
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I'll use the terminals next time I think. Either way her house is much safer with the purple wire nuts and properly installed junctions than the old blacks not in boxes all over the attic that she had before.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:50
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Rufio posted:I'll use the terminals next time I think. Either way her house is much safer with the purple wire nuts and properly installed junctions than the old blacks not in boxes all over the attic that she had before. Absolutely. And to be honest.....if the wire nuts are in boxes.....even flying boxes (gasp!) I'd feel a lot better about it. I'd still put those terminal strips in boxes. Giv any of that poo poo the chance to burn itself out before spreading.
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Mar 31, 2021 23:53
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Elviscat posted:Post pictures of your wiring in the switch box and fan so we can help. I’m an idiot and closed up the wall box before getting a picture, and I don’t have time to open it back up right now. I’ll post pictures tomorrow.
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Apr 1, 2021 01:10
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Ok, I got some pictures: Here are the switches, white here is the line from the breaker box:  Here is the fan. This one is harder to tell, so left is the line going to the switches. Blue & red is for the light, two blacks are for the fan, then the neutral, and ground in the back.  I actually had a very weird experience that makes me think this is something with the fan itself. I was able to turn the light on, even though the switch was in the off position. So if I turn the light switch on first, then the fan switch, the light doesn't come on. Then I flipped the light switch off, and the light came on. If I do this in reverse with both light and fan switches off, then fan switch on first, then light switch on, the light comes on. I am completely baffled as to what is happening.
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Apr 1, 2021 17:06
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I think it would be easier to troubleshoot if you disconnect everything and use a multimeter rather than relying on the fan turning on and off, especially if you suspect a problem with the unit.
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Apr 1, 2021 17:13
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Frankly, I'm not going through all that effort to figure this out, especially since I have a good idea what's going on already. Unless someone can tell me that I wired something wrong from my pictures, I'm 99% sure this is what's going on: Black wire is providing power to both the fan and the light. Blue wire at the fan is connected to a switch in the fan housing to turn the light on. My wall switch is just activating the internal fan switch to turn on the light. I don't know why the fan would be built this way, but it's the only way I see how this is working. There's also a remote that controls the fan and the light, so I know there has to be an internal switch to the light because that is how the remote turns the light on/off.
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Apr 1, 2021 19:43
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They might make them different now but fan remotes often have a controller that you install in the fan box itself and also usually don't have separate blue and black control wires because like you said, you are controlling power to an internal switch. In the fan box: The two wire romex is your incoming power, the black (hot) will provide power to the switches via the white wire on your 3 wire romex. The white from this 2 wire romex is your neutral and should be tied into the white wire coming from your fan. Your 3 wire romex is your switch leg/loop. Your white will be tied to the incoming hot to provide power to the switch. Your red and black will be tied to the black and blue coming from your fan, black is always the fan itself and blue the light kit. In the switch box: your white wire is your hot, drop that to the bottom of both switches. your black and red should be on the top of either switch respectively as your switch legs, which will bring power back up to the fan box and to your fan or light kit. Rufio fucked around with this message at 20:04 on Apr 1, 2021 |
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Apr 1, 2021 20:00
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But sure if this goes in a home owner, landscaping, or wiring thread so figured I'd try them all. Checking around our house after closing and found what appears to be some wires running through a tree. My best guess is there is to be control wires for something and the tree grew around it, after which someone cut the line to maybe run new wiring elsewhere (maybe sprinkler control related?), Buy that's a complete guess. Wife took a couple pictures and I can't really identify anything just from pics, and inspector and seller didn't notice it. Any guess I'm what we might be looking at here?  
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Apr 1, 2021 22:17
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Maybe some LV lights they had up in a tree? I wouldn't worry about it either way.
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Apr 1, 2021 22:29
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Rufio posted:They might make them different now but fan remotes often have a controller that you install in the fan box itself and also usually don't have separate blue and black control wires because like you said, you are controlling power to an internal switch. I never had to install a controller in the fan. It was preinstalled. All the wiring you listed is exactly how I wired it up.
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Apr 1, 2021 22:57
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I'm trying to research various pieces of code to figure out how I want to get conductors to my new panel box, and am having a hard time. So I want to buy the actual book to make my life easier. Is buying it straight from the source the way to go? I checked Amazon and they seem to be flush with incredibly lovely counterfeits, but that's it. https://catalog.nfpa.org/NFPA-70-National-Electrical-Code-NEC-Spiralbound-P14880.aspx
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Apr 2, 2021 04:52
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SpartanIvy posted:I'm trying to research various pieces of code to figure out how I want to get conductors to my new panel box, and am having a hard time. Google "free NEC" and click the link that takes you to the NFPA website, the entire text is available for free online, though it's a bit byzantine to get to. E: of course I can't loving link it  Just reading the text of the code can also be hard to... practicalize, so feel free to ask questions here where people with experience can offer recommendations.
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Apr 2, 2021 06:19
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SpartanIvy posted:I'm trying to research various pieces of code to figure out how I want to get conductors to my new panel box, and am having a hard time. The code book isn't going to make your life any easier I don't think. To be honest if you need more home runs, you should probably hire a professional but I guess that isn't what this thread is for. If its that box you posted last page that is surface mounted on the outside of the house, then you only have a few options. From first glance I would probably run another conduit up into the soffit and just push wires through there, much like they did with that sealtight flex conduit. Just use something large so you can bring a few romex without a problem. Maybe even run a few spares up into the attic so you don't have to try and push more wires through later.
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Apr 2, 2021 13:43
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