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Posted by on October 16, 2007, 5:47 am
>On Oct 16, 10:51 am, alvinamo...@notmail.com wrote:
>> I have done wiring for years, and I always find the problem, but even
>> after years of doing it, it sometimes can take some time to find the
>> culprit. Be patient, and just open each box and check. Tighten all
>> wire screws while you are at it.
>
>It's easy enough to open any box with an outlet. Trouble is there may
>be an unknown number of boxes that only contain junctions and don't
>show.
>
>Wire nuts, ugh. Might as well swap them all out for chocolate blocks
>while you're at it.
Did you know that if you remove all the wirenuts from all wires, all
wiring would be female? :)
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Posted by Chris Lewis on October 16, 2007, 9:28 am
> You did open the first dead outlet and said it looks fine. Thats a
> good start. However, the problem is likely in the outlet BEFORE the
> first dead one, unless of course these 3 "outlets" are the only thing
> on that circuit. If the first one is on your office, it would likely
> be the outlet closest to this dead one, either to the left or right.
Most of the replies are making the assumption that these outlets
worked at some time in the past _after_ the renovation. It doesn't
sound like that to me.
I'm thinking it's a good possibility that the contractor cut the
cable to these outlets because he was going to rewire it to the
new work he was doing, and forgot. Or thought it wasn't serving
anything, and abandoned it.
Yes, checking the new boxes, and the dead ones, to see if anything
is loose or simply not connected is a good idea. If she can figure
out where each cable goes, it'd help too.
Unless something obvious is found, however, I think her best
bet is to get an electrician in who has a good wire tracer. Otherwise,
I very much fear this is going to be a rip off the walls exercise.
Watch out for buried junctions. Code violation, and lead to problems
like you're experiencing.
Simply adding a new feed to the abandoned bit would work, _if_ it's
abandoned. It could be partially connected, and cross-feeding could
cause a lot more problems.
Fire hazard? Probably not.
--
Chris Lewis,
Age and Treachery will Triumph over Youth and Skill
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.
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Posted by Norminn on October 16, 2007, 8:53 am
clipped
>
> And, erm... considering it's two years after the fact, and realizing this is
> a bit late to be asking... is there any risk of fire with the dead wiring in
> the walls?
>
> As always, thanks for your kind assistance. Help me Obi-Wan! You're my
> only hope! (Well, my only hope other than calling an electrician and
> opening up the finished walls. Eek.)
>
> Thanks!
>
> Donna
>
>
We recently had a problem in our condo when the upstairs neighbor was
nailing flooring and electricity for one of our circuits went out. It
tripped the breaker twice, but the guy wasn't easy to discourage. He
did it again, and then the breaker would not come back on. I knew
exactly where it occurred the first time, as I was sitting directly
below where he was working when the lights went out. The other times we
were not aware immediately, but when I went up to talk to him, he showed
me where he had been working .. about 8' from the breaker panel. When
the electrician came out, he first took the wire for the dead circuit
and connected it to another breaker to see if it was the breaker. It
didn't work on a good breaker, so he knew it was the wire. He detatched
it again and just pulled it out .. the wire had burned through entirely
and the insulation had numerous nail nicks. It burned through exactly
where the fellow had been working. This is wiring inside a metal
conduit. They had a tough time getting new wire through the conduit due
to the nails, but they did it. I was pretty impressed with the burned
wire and insulation. I kept it as a souveneir.
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