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Motronic posted:Lotus LRG2s: https://www.lotusledlights.com/recessed-lighting/gimbal/2-inch-regressed-gimbal-led-recessed-lighting I like those a lot. I helped a friend with a kitchen remodel of his 1960's built former parsonage and suggested something like that - nope, wanted 6" cans in TYOOL2020.
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Apr 3, 2021 01:22
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angryrobots posted:I like those a lot. I helped a friend with a kitchen remodel of his 1960's built former parsonage and suggested something like that - nope, wanted 6" cans in TYOOL2020. I may go 3" LED in a larger room, but I'm am so ripping every last 6" can out of this place as I redo rooms. (2.5" rough opening is not fun to get a long flex bit through to drill through more than one joist....you just don't have the angle and can't fit the bit handle in there) E: also gave me an excuse to buy a new cross line green laser to do layout.  (just look at those ugly rear end old 6" cans. COME ON. The dark, heavy ceiling fan is also in the trash now.) Motronic fucked around with this message at 01:35 on Apr 3, 2021 |
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Apr 3, 2021 01:25
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Motronic posted:I may go 3" LED in a larger room, but I'm am so ripping every last 6" can out of this place as I redo rooms. Those look good, how big is the room? How high is the ceiling, and what spacing did you use? I'm a time traveler from 2008 who last installed 6" cans, and don't know anything about these newfangled lighting technologies.
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Apr 3, 2021 01:37
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Elviscat posted:Those look good, how big is the room? How high is the ceiling, and what spacing did you use? This is a 12x15 room, 8' 4" ceiling. They're held about 2.5 feet off the walls, and in a 4/2/4 pattern (new and lighter looking ceiling fan to go between the 2). The strings of 4 are just about 24" apart center to center. This is reno, so measurements are less "exact" and more "make it look right in a place that isn't dimensionally accurate."  Part of the intention here is that three of those corner lights will be gimbaled into a wall wash/picture lighting. Then the rest can be gimbaled around a bit to cover the rest of the room appropriately, including sending the 2 in the middle inwards just a bit to cover under the ceiling fan. Yes, I was doing math on the celling height vs. cutoff angle of the lights as well as lumen calculations. This choice was part of a class of lighting we selected and these particular ones made the final cut based on specs. Yes, thereis paper coving the old can holes at this point while were were doing a layout with construction paper just because it made it easier to visualize. I tried to take as little out of the room as possible until the layout was done so we had a better idea of what the final product would look like. The room is stripped and tarped by now. Edit edit: you can also tell from the paint and fabric samples that the entire lighting/ceiling thing was just massive loving scope creep. But might as well do it while you're tearing the place up already. Motronic fucked around with this message at 01:59 on Apr 3, 2021 |
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Apr 3, 2021 01:49
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I'm lost Backstory; my wife and I just bought and moved into our first home. Everything was seemingly a-okay until the carpet cleaners came and blew a breaker (I wasn't here, but it seems like this is where the problem started). Now we have intermittent lighting and receptacle's at the basement entrance/hallway. The breaker that the lights are on is on, but the lights are still totally intermittent. As in; don't work for hours and then randomly come on briefly, and back to not working again. Other parts of the same circuit are working totally fine. This is the area I'm suspicious of Switch off  Switch on  Receptacle below switch that the tester is plugged into. I messed with two wires that were pushed into the back - apparently you can't do the screws and the push in combined, what I was messing with before I thought to come here.  Fluorescents that look jankily wired into that area, above the switch and receptacle  I'm going to take a crack at trying to explain how this is seemingly all interconnected. When you come in the basement entrance there's two switches on your right. The first switch is the light outside the garage; intermittent. The second switch is the light just above you and for the light going into the hallway to the left; intermittent. This is a three way switch, there's a second switch for these lights on the landing coming in the front door of the house. A little further down the hallway there's a second switch (the one pictured above), this controls the two fluorescent's in the ceiling and seems to be intertwined with the receptacle below it.. intermittent! And then finally, around the corner there's an outlet that is also on and off. The part I really don't understand is why other parts of the circuit are functional, but this area is on and off. I've replaced the three-way switches, along with the two outlets. Helppp surivdaoreht fucked around with this message at 10:32 on Apr 3, 2021 |
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Apr 3, 2021 10:27
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Sounds like a loose connection. I'm a little surprised you didn't find anything burnt or at least smelling burnt. When you reinstalled your devices, did you wrap around the screw or stab them in? I would recommend always wrapping the wire. When troubleshooting I try to trace what I think is the path of the circuit away from the panel and disconnect devices along the route. On your receptacles, you could remove them and just wire nut. On your switches you mostly want to check your neutrals that are bundled together and any pigtailed hot. You said some of your circuit works fine, I would start at the last place it works. Also maybe check the attic for a junction box in that area. Edit: Do you have a multimeter? It's a lot easier to troubleshoot if you have one. Rufio fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Apr 4, 2021 |
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Apr 3, 2021 12:42
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surivdaoreht posted:Fluorescents that look jankily wired into that area, above the switch and receptacle The fact that the splice there isn't in a box is a huge red flag - you'd really want to start at the closest place to to the panel you can find, and go through every junction/fixture and review what's actually happening.
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Apr 4, 2021 01:04
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OK I'm an idiot; given this box here (https://www.hammfg.com/files/parts/pdf/CHKO664.pdf), what size fittings / conduit can I actually use? That 1.01" is perfect for a 3/4" set screw fitting I got from Home Depot, but I foolishly thought I'd get a 1" conduit / fitting there. Or do I just get my step drill bit and make these into the size I want? I just see a lot of seemingly 'standard' looking knockout patterns on the panel side as well, and want to know what the right item for terminating EMT is. As long as I terminate it properly, no big deal right? e: I guess this page sums it up if I don't want to get cutting with a drill bit https://www.wilsontool.com/en-us/news/technical-articles/punching/eko-basics movax fucked around with this message at 04:13 on Apr 4, 2021 |
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Apr 4, 2021 04:10
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Rule of thumb, I read, is max 10 outlets on a 20a circuit. Is this still 10 on a split circuit with shared neutral (two 20a breakers)? Or is it 5 each breaker? Or 10 total distributed across both? Or 20 outlets?
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Apr 4, 2021 05:13
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Don't get wrapped around the axle with some "rule of thumb" you read on the internet somewhere. Think about how many watts of stuff will be plugged in, if it's more watts, do less outlets, read the last couple pages we talked about it a lot. First multiwire circuits, treat each circuit no different than you would if it had a dedicated neutral. movax posted:OK I'm an idiot; given this box here (https://www.hammfg.com/files/parts/pdf/CHKO664.pdf), what size fittings / conduit can I actually use? That 1.01" is perfect for a 3/4" set screw fitting I got from Home Depot, but I foolishly thought I'd get a 1" conduit / fitting there. NPS strikes again! That size box? Drill away, you can modify enclosures. Google "schedule 40 pipe dimensions" and you'll get some helpful tables, the O.D for, say a 1" nominal pipe (1.315") will give you the actual size hole you need for the trade size fitting, go a little over so you can actually fit it, not so much over that the locknut won't fit. Most step drills go to the nearest size that's not under the desired hole size. Greenlee et. al. make electrician's step bits where each step is a good fit for the next size up conduit fitting. Just to be clear, a 3/4" EMT set screw adapter uses the same size threads as a 3/4" schedule 40 pipe/conduit. Elviscat fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Apr 4, 2021 |
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Apr 4, 2021 06:52
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Elviscat posted:Don't get wrapped around the axle with some "rule of thumb" you read on the internet somewhere. Think about how many watts of stuff will be plugged in, if it's more watts, do less outlets, read the last couple pages we talked about it a lot. I agree, I just want to tell my dad he's wrong and the two outlets I added are fine. I'm not adding 20 outlets. Circuit A goes to my kitchen and 4 wall outlets. This is the toaster, microwave, oven, and fridge. Circuit B also goes to my kitchen and shares a neutral with A. This goes to 4 indoor outlets - with a LED nightlight, a phone charging station, the garbage disposal, and occasionally a Kitchenaid or a blender. Circuit B also goes through the wall to an outdoor outlet. I ran conduit off of this to add two more outdoor outlets. These are used to power a string of LED lights over the patio, my pellet grill, and I'm planning on adding a ceiling fan to my gazebo. Occasionally I'll plug in a power tool.
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Apr 4, 2021 13:48
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Sounds like circuit A needs to be split up
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Apr 4, 2021 14:45
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FogHelmut posted:I agree, I just want to tell my dad he's wrong and the two outlets I added are fine. I'm not adding 20 outlets. The code sez that those kitchen circuits are supposed to be dedicated to the kitchen and shall not serve any other devices. Even lighting in the kitchen is a bit iffy. If there's already an outdoor outlet there and you daisy-chain off of it, you could probably play "I'm a stupid homeowner" and it'll slide, but an actual inspector will tell you that those outlets have to be on a different circuit, as well as being GFCI. The idea behind the two kitchen circuits is basically a row of slow-cookers all going at once. Running your circular saw on the porch at the same time someone's using the blender and garbage disposal is an instant trip, and it's not particularly obvious to the blender-and-disposal people that your saw outside is the culprit.
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Apr 4, 2021 18:22
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I think it's kinda a grey area, if he was running the initial circuit I'd 100% say not to add any exterior outlets or anything, but it's already wired like that, and an extra outlet for some lights isn't a substantive change, and shouldn't buy OP into making a new homerun or rewiring his kitchen. The best, and correct, way to do it would be to take the time to run a new 20A circuit for the outdoor outlets. My one outdoor outlet was chained off a kitchen GFI, and yeah, I had tripping issues, and I ended up adding a 20A outlet right next to the panel, and another 20A circuit pulled to the other side of the house.
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Apr 4, 2021 19:27
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Elviscat posted:I think it's kinda a grey area, if he was running the initial circuit I'd 100% say not to add any exterior outlets or anything, but it's already wired like that, and an extra outlet for some lights isn't a substantive change, and shouldn't buy OP into making a new homerun or rewiring his kitchen. Agreed on all points.
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Apr 4, 2021 19:32
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Great points, should be fairly easy to run a dedicated line based on the location. Edit: so once I fix that, here comes the other part: I installed a gazebo on my patio and I want to put a ceiling fan in it. The outlet is about 27" from the gazebo support post, and there's about 10" of patio in that space. I really don't want to dig up any of my patio to have the conduit emerge from the ground at the gazebo post. I kinda don't want to run a swag line from the fan to an extension cord because that seems redneckish on all kinds of levels. When I initially laid it out, I was thinking I was just going to plug in the LED string lights, wasn't planning on a ceiling fan. Are these the only options? Crude drawing: 
FogHelmut fucked around with this message at 23:34 on Apr 4, 2021 |
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Apr 4, 2021 22:02
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My partner and I just bought a new-to-us house that was built in 1930. The electricity has been done piecemeal over the years and is byzantine in nature. A bunch of the house electric is on a sub-panel, and a ton of the wiring is cloth-wrapped (no knob and tube though). The labelling on the main box and the subpanel is not very helpful/explanatory so I've slowly been mapping it out with a noncontact voltage tester and a little circuit tester with probes. So my question is, is it possible that a run could start with the old cloth-wrapped wiring and then have more recent wire spliced in later in the run, and then run in such a way that receptacles later in the run show up as grounded to one of those three-prong testers even if it doesn't end up grounded all the way to the box? And, if so, that seems like it's potentially very very bad? Sorry if I'm using the wrong language - I'm still learning about this stuff.
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Apr 5, 2021 01:06
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Danhenge posted:My partner and I just bought a new-to-us house that was built in 1930. The electricity has been done piecemeal over the years and is byzantine in nature. A bunch of the house electric is on a sub-panel, and a ton of the wiring is cloth-wrapped (no knob and tube though). The labelling on the main box and the subpanel is not very helpful/explanatory so I've slowly been mapping it out with a noncontact voltage tester and a little circuit tester with probes. Cowboy ground is always a possibility. It's super unlikely that someone home-ran a ground and didn't just make it a whole new circuit. Or someone bonded the ground to a pipe or something where they spliced it in.
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Apr 5, 2021 01:18
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Yes. Surprisingly, that can be done legally, the code still has an exception to allow a ground wire run external to old cables to provide a ground. As for very very bad, no, but maybe not great, those installations tended to be pretty sketch, I've never seen one I'd trust. But it's better than no ground path. What would be very bad is if the ground path is tied to the neutral at some point to fool a three prong tester, that's a shock hazard.
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Apr 5, 2021 01:21
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It's a circuit that ends up in the bathroom. It's possible there's metal pipe in the wall somewhere, but all of the pipes hit pvc in the basement as far as I can tell. I need to get an electrician out here anyway, so I guess I'll ask them to take a look at the situation.
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Apr 5, 2021 01:34
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So I had an actual electrician come through, and it ended up being a poor connection via a pushed in wire at the receptacle. He removed the open junction, for obvious reasons that I'm only just figuring out. New question, I bought a timer switch for the bathroom fan, and when I pulled the switches out to see about wiring it in, I saw this  Why are the black wires linked together at the bottom?
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Apr 5, 2021 11:26
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Power in to the box and power out. Looping the wire around the screw like that, with the wire continuing on, is a shitass way to connect a wire, when you replace the switch you should gather those two wires under one nut, with two pigtails coming out, one for each device (switch/timer/etc)
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Apr 5, 2021 14:51
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Oh wow that's the incoming and outgoing hot connected to different switches then spliced after the loop? Lmao that is a new one for me
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Apr 5, 2021 15:41
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surivdaoreht posted:So I had an actual electrician come through, and it ended up being a poor connection via a pushed in wire at the receptacle. He removed the open junction, for obvious reasons that I'm only just figuring out. For the rest of your house's wiring, do not use "this is what was there" as a guide for new installation. Look up the right way to do things and assume that the slack-jawed yokels that did the installation on your electrical last time did it the wrong way. That picture is a "I'm going to save ten seconds by stripping in the middle. Crap. Stripped in the wrong spot. Meh. I'm not going to bother doing it right, I'll just grab scrap off the floor and make a little jumper." Having a "bad connection via a pushed wire" is exactly the reason everyone says not to use the "pushed wire" part of the receptacle (unless you know what the difference is). For anything you install, if there's more than one device in the box, every device gets its own set of short wires (known as pigtails) wrapped around its screw terminals. These pigtails are then connected up to the wires in the box in the correct configuration. This ensures you'll always have enough wire to fix whatever problem exists, and makes troubleshooting far easier, as you can largely rule out the device itself as being part of the problem.
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Apr 5, 2021 16:00
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I'm not entirely sure if this fits in the thread but since we're dealing with 220 VAC I guess this is the best place for this kind of question. Background: I would like to add some lights through the holes in the top corners of this mirror.  I rummaged through my brother's collection of parts. He's an electrician who has a habit of salvaging parts from worksites. He had a few ceramic bulb holders, but only one of them was glazed.  The glazed one looks a lot more refined, but I haven't been able to find another for sale anywhere. Are the glazed porcelain bulb holders of this type even produced any longer and if not, what vintage of light fixture would I need to sacrifice to obtain another?
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Apr 5, 2021 20:20
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https://www.antiquelampsupply.com/glazed-porcelain-u-clip-snap-in-med-base-socket-with-double-clip-mounts-in-1-17-32-dia-hole.html
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Apr 5, 2021 20:41
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A "licensed and bonded" electrician supposedly replaced this outlet within the last week. 
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Apr 5, 2021 21:50
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Licensed to Kill, maybe. Would explain the "Bond"ed part. E: it's actually sloppy but not too bad. The two ground wires should be nutted together and not loosely twisted. Additionally the wire loops being screwed down should be done so that the screw tightens the wire onto it as it's turned, only one neutral is setup that way. Ideally the outlet would have been pigtailed off the 2 sets of wires. SpartanIvy fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Apr 5, 2021 |
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Apr 5, 2021 22:04
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Jasper Tin Neck posted:I'm not entirely sure if this fits in the thread but since we're dealing with 220 VAC I guess this is the best place for this kind of question. By your 220v comment I assume you're somewhere in the EU. Most of the posters here are US based, but I think it's pretty universal that trying to turn that mirror into a fixture base with wiring in the wall is a bad idea. The holders your brother had, are replacement parts for a fixture that is designed to use them. I think you'd be better off finding a cord-and-plug bulbholder (in whatever flavor of voltage and plug end type your country uses) and hiding the cord(s) behind or around the edge of the mirror and plugging into an existing receptacle.
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Apr 5, 2021 22:33
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yeah you'd be better off just fixing some batten lamp holders over the holes and running a flex to a socket
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Apr 5, 2021 22:47
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SpartanIvy posted:Licensed to Kill, maybe. I mean, it's utterly shameful for a professional electrician. It's one circumstance I wouldn't pigtail, because doing so would introduce copper to an aluminum wire situation. At least they used a CO/ALR device. E: I also want to know why Al wire is running to a new work box from the last 20 years.
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Apr 5, 2021 22:58
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SpartanIvy posted:Licensed to Kill, maybe. Yeah, some backstory on that outlet. We were under contract to buy that house. Our inspector noted the fact that most of the outlets and switches in that house were not rated for aluminum wiring. We did an addendum to the contract stating that the seller will replace the affected outlets and switches with ones rated for aluminum wiring. We did a walkthrough before our original closing date to find that none of that work had been done. They might have replaced the outlets and switches with new ones, but they were not aluminum rated. Closing date was pushed in order to get the work properly done. The seller stated that the work was done by a licensed and bonded electrician, but they didn't pull permits to complete the work, which are required in our jurisdiction. They also have refused to provide the license number for the electrician they used, which leads me to believe that they're not licensed and bonded. They also agreed to repair the whole home generator, and did replace some parts in the automatic transfer switch so that the generator would run and power the house, but the generator was not automatically starting on upon loss of utility power. Instead of repairing the generator as agreed, they decided to have the COO of a construction company with some sort of tie to the sellers write a letter stating that the generator did not come with that functionality from the factory. I proved that false with a 10 minute call to the manufacturer. Needless to say, with the sellers not satisfying the contract they agreed to, we're walking away from this house.
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Apr 5, 2021 23:09
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n0tqu1tesane posted:Yeah, some backstory on that outlet. We were under contract to buy that house. Our inspector noted the fact that most of the outlets and switches in that house were not rated for aluminum wiring. We did an addendum to the contract stating that the seller will replace the affected outlets and switches with ones rated for aluminum wiring. We did a walkthrough before our original closing date to find that none of that work had been done. They might have replaced the outlets and switches with new ones, but they were not aluminum rated. Closing date was pushed in order to get the work properly done. The seller stated that the work was done by a licensed and bonded electrician, but they didn't pull permits to complete the work, which are required in our jurisdiction. They also have refused to provide the license number for the electrician they used, which leads me to believe that they're not licensed and bonded. Good move. There are more houses. LOL if the sellers come back offering to fulfill the contract to avoid losing the sale. Unfortunately, in this market, there are plenty of people lining up to get screwed.
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Apr 5, 2021 23:11
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n0tqu1tesane posted:Needless to say, with the sellers not satisfying the contract they agreed to, we're walking away from this house. You should have saved yourself the rest of this trouble the second you found out it had aluminum wiring. That is, unless you were buying it at a price indicative of and prepared for a full gut remodel or complete teardown. Al is a deal killer for me.
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Apr 5, 2021 23:12
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Motronic posted:You should have saved yourself the rest of this trouble the second you found out it had aluminum wiring. That is, unless you were buying it at a price indicative of and prepared for a full gut remodel or complete teardown. Al is a deal killer for me. Or unless you're able/willing to immediately do a full rewire.
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Apr 5, 2021 23:14
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Elviscat posted:Or unless you're able/willing to immediately do a full rewire. I mean, that's what I was alluding to on full gut. I guess I was being dramatic, but a full rewire on something old enough to have AL that still has AL is likely to be substantial. It's indicative of maintenance level/never being remodeled. Also lol that the "licensed and bonded" electrician who's licensure can not be disclosed can't even get the loops in the right direction under all of the screws. Sorry, doesn't pass the sniff test for someone who has sufficient trade experience to do that kind of thing in their sleep. Motronic fucked around with this message at 23:27 on Apr 5, 2021 |
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Apr 5, 2021 23:24
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sharkytm posted:Good move. There are more houses. LOL if the sellers come back offering to fulfill the contract to avoid losing the sale. They're not even offering to fulfill the contract at this point. Their agent texted my agent this:  And then this:  They're supposedly two weeks from closing on another house, and I'd bet that financing for that house is contingent on selling this one, so they're getting desperate.
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Apr 5, 2021 23:39
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n0tqu1tesane posted:They're supposedly two weeks from closing on another house, and I'd bet that financing for that house is contingent on selling this one, so they're getting desperate. Sucks to be them.
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Apr 6, 2021 00:05
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n0tqu1tesane posted:They're not even offering to fulfill the contract at this point. Their agent texted my agent this: They're playing chicken with you hoping you're more desperate than them and they're about to go careening off the cliff.
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Apr 6, 2021 00:10
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Their "licensed and bonded" electrician is clearly a relative who knows some 'lectricals and needs beer money.
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Apr 6, 2021 00:12
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