Electricians Spend Hours Correcting Other People's Bad Wiring
26 posts across 8 communities in the last 30 days; 54% from r/electricians.
“ya, love it when my I'm on call for 2 weeks out of every month for my contractor...calling me at 2am to get on a bridge with 50 people to try and fix the sheetrock issue...4 hours later I need to get up to then work another 8-10. And then hope I don't get called again tonight.”
“Had a service call to fix a lost neutral that caused loss of power. The problem was simple but hard to find. The famous receptacle backstab connections have failed that interrupted the neutral down the stream. While examining one of the panels with originated circuit, I…”
“customer says the outlet in their bedroom stopped working. no tripped breaker, no gfci, nothing obvious. i get there and start tracing. turns out a backstabbed outlet upstream had finally given up. classic. what got me though was the guy watching me the whole time. asking…”
Electricians are frustrated by encountering poorly executed work, including incorrect wiring and dangerous installations. This leads to wasted time correcting mistakes made by others, impacting productivity and potentially compromising safety.
SOURCES (60)
“https://preview.redd.it/kgl5w0plbzvh1.jpeg?width=2048&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4c3214909d78dcf01332b7946b639f9ad4a3d54b Cable company wrecked my shit. They repaired, and probably threw 10lbs of seed at this spot. Middle pic is maybe 1.5 weeks after they seeded. Bottom is from day 1 of my renno this year. That grass came in so thick it felt like…”
“Building lost a phase to a 277/480 panel. Run of 350 aluminum kcmil was 600 ft. This was pulled out 10 ft below the outdoor switch gear. Entire run needed to be repulled. submitted by /u/SuperdaveOZY [link] [comments]”
“Yall ever run MC to a panel? This is a remodel turning a doctors office into a training center. Lots of switches, outlets, cameras, card reader, etc being added. Foreman didn’t order emt and said to use 12/2 and 12/4 going to the panels(12/2 in the picture) I think it looks like shit, at the bare minimum I think it should be in flex. Second week at a new company so I’m not trying to piss everybody off Thoughts? Is it allowed? Have you done it? What is the customer gonna say? submitted by &”
“They turned off the breaker, thankfully. submitted by /u/GoodElectricNW [link] [comments]”
“I've worked with PILC, XLPE, EPR but what's this? No one I worked with has seen it before besides one dude and he doesn't know, is it HDPE? I know it's 180 mil. 7200v, peelable jacket with a thick spacer cable like insulation then cloth and conductor. Termination at the pole failed, ended up splicing it to 345 mil XLPE because these mfers are too cheap to replace it, single pad radial in conduit but that's too much I guess 😂 Bonus photo of the ancient pad submitted by”
“Customer was like "ya I just need like 4 I-beams replaced, should take like a week, I know it's a little ambitious" good thing this was t&m because fuckin no, this job was like 4 x what you thought it would be and I'll be going slow and safe my guy. submitted by /u/ChromiumVI [link] [comments]”
“What's your favorite type of job? For me it has to be big entrance swaps, jobs not done yet tho. Feel free to judge the state of the electrical room. submitted by /u/nothinbutahounddogg [link] [comments]”
“Now everyone after you need to suffer without an end until a major job to replace the box. submitted by /u/killedbyboar [link] [comments]”
“Power Distribution Center for a 2500KVA transformer got spicy. submitted by /u/Fair_Pangolin_4295 [link] [comments]”
Got it. So you only use 100g cables for each spark instead of 200g?
“I do this and have a central ups Pro tip there are poe powered switches that give poe to other devices”
“I think it belongs to the electricians. submitted by /u/SkoobyHD [link] [comments]”
“Of course I gotta add a plug to this room of all places. Only box in here. That’s not the feed. Feed is a 1” emt with 2 more circuits than that. And yes you can guess nothing is derated. submitted by /u/Fragrant_Major_9553 [link] [comments]”
“Rate this job by a fellow maintenance man. Tell me what you think or know he did wrong… submitted by /u/FuckkkOfffffMaaate [link] [comments]”
“When the grid gets demoed and your scope is to re-support all existing cables and conduits….. submitted by /u/DB-Davis23 [link] [comments]”
“I’ve had many weird issues over the years solved by swapping a patch cable. I always remind my techs to bring power and network cables to and service call. Only once you’ve checked that do you move up to other troubleshooting.”
“Going back to remove 5 at an important client's house, but no supplier in my area has another brand smoke which supports wireless interconnect. Take heed fellow electrical workers, you will regret installing these. submitted by /u/CEC4EVER [link] [comments]”
“ya, love it when my I'm on call for 2 weeks out of every month for my contractor...calling me at 2am to get on a bridge with 50 people to try and fix the sheetrock issue...4 hours later I need to get up to then work another 8-10. And then hope I don't get called again tonight.”
“I think the 2 ports at the bottom are an explanation; someone that shouldn’t have access tonit has access.”
“He definitely took a ton of pride in his work. But its just a ton of overkill that actually makes servicing the service tee components more difficult than it has to be as code in this area doesnt dictate any insulation at all.”
“Long story short, yesterday, four of us demo’d out an MDP (with an 800A main). Hardest part was the conduit was outside on the building, 20 feet up. Cut it in sections, and were able to pull big meaty boys out. I really kick myself for not stripping it down - I don’t have a machine, but I’m pretty slick with skinning with the knife - especially it was sitting in the sun all day, it was as malleable as it could’ve been. I was just so tired, and wanted to get it out. All things considered, I was t”
“Had a service call to fix a lost neutral that caused loss of power. The problem was simple but hard to find. The famous receptacle backstab connections have failed that interrupted the neutral down the stream. While examining one of the panels with originated circuit, I discovered some crazy distribution of the circuits. They all MWBC with shared neutrals. Couple of neutrals were kind of burnt at the bus bar. All solid wires are pain to trace but I confirmed that at least some neutrals have same”
“yep but the wallet sometimes is tight enough to bring that down to a single path... and sometimes a single circuit...”
“oh no I agree, but often times they just look at cost... We have a client that has redundant circuits from the same provider... because "the cost was better than using 2 different providers" I also have a client that has 3 providers, one fiber, a wireless shot, and starlink... one's a medical clinic and the other is a trucking company...”
“The electrician needs access to his panel just worried about how much this duct is being chocked submitted by /u/darksoul7789 [link] [comments]”
“I mean is this what the electrical industry is seriously going towards now. This shit is genuinely pathetic man...."The Original Electrician" in Sarasota FL submitted by /u/Responsible-Kiwi-898 [link] [comments]”
“Hello, I wanted to run this by a group possibly more knowledgeable than I am. I am an electrician but don’t get to install Bus Duct. I was on a job today and I watched another trade go up on the bus duct. I said that is not a good idea and is super dangerous to be on there. I walked away. My heart was racing a bit. I looked up dangers of bus duct and showed it to his ground guy. Death, major injury etc. I believe it was rated at 3200 amps of arc fault current. Did I over react ? I was worried I”
“customer says the outlet in their bedroom stopped working. no tripped breaker, no gfci, nothing obvious. i get there and start tracing. turns out a backstabbed outlet upstream had finally given up. classic. what got me though was the guy watching me the whole time. asking questions. not in an annoying way, just genuinely curious. said he'd had three different companies out over the years for various stuff and every single one tried to sell him a panel upgrade or a whole-home surge protector”
“Finished replacing MI cable, we had 6 rolls of 75 meters with pre made cold leads so we had to use up all the cable we had with us. submitted by /u/MaTi959 [link] [comments]”
“Fixing someone else’s work… they cut out the pump and re wired the low voltage like this! Claimed to be coming back with new pump and never answered the phone. Pump works fine btw 🤦♂️ submitted by /u/DabLordian [link] [comments]”
“Been doing fulltime maintenance in a Hospital. There are four electricians. This is what I've accumulated over the passed 5 years. Every one was stuck in an outlet. I plan to work here for another 20-25 years so I'll post again then and make sure it's my parting gift to somebody here when I retire. It makes me laugh that I collect them to someday give to another electrician. 🤣 submitted by /u/SloppyPlatypus69 [link] [comments]”
“i had an electrician install a mini split for me. and this is how he left it. said he was going to come back. but never did. how bad is it? for context, he decided for some reason to run a 240 volt 30 amp wire from the breaker to a 115 v mini split. he said it would be better, but then couldn’t get it to work so he opted to just leave the hot and neutral 240 volt uncapped (which i since turned off from breaker + capped) in the receptacle. then he spliced a 13 amp black extension cord and plugged”
“Cool. Did you plug something else into it's outlet just be sure the outlet works? Gfci outlets will go bad with a quickness these days.”
“Barn for horses. Sconces, security lights, and exterior outlets. Most I did before this was maybe an offset or two, so needless to say there was a lot of adjusting. We don’t do a lot of EMT but I actually find it really enjoyable. Some of you guys get to do this all day? submitted by /u/Vihtic [link] [comments]”
“It abso-fucking-lutely is an electric line. It's a primary distribution underground power line... It may have been abandoned by now and is just a dead wire "only the power company would know" but may also still be energized.”
“Six years in the gas & electric field, now working more on the contractor and vendor side. I talk to transmission & distribution linemen, tower builders, welders, operators , dump truck driver and everything related to gas and electric utilities and every day and I keep hearing the same gripes about stuff that just… never gets better. Not looking for “fire my GF” or “management are idiots.” I mean the specific stuff. The form you fill out three times. The system that’s been broken since”
“Hey guys, I just had an electrician instal a Mini split at my house today and I asked him to cut the line set down so that it wasn’t rolled but it looks like line is about 4 feet long total, it seems to be operating OK but I’m concerned that the line set might be below the minimum length required. Doesn’t seem like there’s anything in the manual regarding minimum length, but wanted to get feedback. See image. Inside it is right near the side of the wall. submitted by /u/justpullin [l”
“Sorry not as quick as I thought - got locked in on the rant 😂😂 Huge storm swept by yesterday that was pretty intense. Lighting hit super close to my customers property - they get an error 91 on the thermostat for loss of communication. Okay perfect hopefully just a quick breaker reset. Turn each breaker off waited 10-15 minutes, flipped the air handler breaker on first, then the condenser. No luck. Tested VDC at the air handler 12vdc - excellent, behind the thermostat 12vdc - excellent, took l”
“(not my work) Customer sent me a couple of pics, and wants help correcting a few things. Rerouting EGC changing the romex originally in the conduit to something weather resistant. He used UF-B instead of THWN 🤦🏻♂️, probably will pass now. He also swapped a GFCI to a WR one. (I'm surprised the inspector noticed something like that) It became clear to me that he's at the edge of his understanding, so I offered to do a clean up and reroute the ground for $350. Travel time of 30 min makes”
“So for context the formerly sheathed bundle (pic 3) was yanked several times by someone thinking it was a weed, followed by mowing it and shredding up parts of the cables. It has since been patched to the best of abilities currently and matching colors before powering on. The issue has persisted and the thermostat isn't sending a signal to the AC unit via the low voltage wires. I'm not sure if there is something I'm missing here or if there could be some kinda of connector damage fro”
“So here's the best possible outcome (considering the NPO's finances) One of the volunteers is paying a local (union) electrician to deploy a UL 1449 listed, 120/208V SPD at the panel feeding the pair of UPS protecting the core switch, firewalls, and NVR. Supposedly the NPO will purchase UL 1449 listed SPD for the IDF racks as funds allow. The folks who donated the damaged hardware have put them on donation hold until the power issue is full resolved (UPS at each IDF rack + the SPD)”
“As a technician and now an engineer, please stop with this "there is no limit" shit. There is a limit, lying to the customers I end up taking care of just makes it worse for everyone.”
“Frozen pipes in mobile homes. They never want to pay what could be 3-4 hours of work”
“Now I’m known for some “creative wiring”. This is not my handy work. Mine would be much cleaner. And working. submitted by /u/heldoglykke [link] [comments]”
“Original post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Construction/s/KTj2n02dle Wow thank you all soooo much for the expert advice and some funny comments. I love the construction community. Some of you were so thorough! So, I ended up showing a PT repair specialist who confirmed that the cable was cut in a way that does matter, contrary to what my contractor was saying. They quoted $1500 to repair it so I’ll be going that route. They will open 12-18 more inches of exterior cement, pour in new cement, and pul”