I've got another one for you, I'm a contractor who was remodeling a home and was updating the wiring during a gut job, so we killed the main breaker and went into the attic to start cutting the spaghetti factory of wiring outta there, I cut a wire that was running out of a junction box ( and not hooked to anything on the one end) and POW, blew my new pair of Klein's. Went to investigate to see how that was even possible since the power was turned off and discovered that there was 10-2 wire jammed in the main lugs of the service panel feeding a sub panel hidden in the rafters of the attic 🤯

I worked at a 322 room 3 building hotel recently. built possibly in the 60/s or a little later one of the electrician rooms 1000s of breaker switches all federal pacific powering all rooms ac units everything to my knowledge it’s never been redone

I worked in a government building that used breakers as switches and they were underrated and obsolete. They wouldn’t upgrade until I threatened to report them to OSHA. That was like showing a cross to a vampire! They did upgrade! Unfortunately Sometimes it’s all about money over safety.

Sounds like you killed it. (Or you didn’t🤷‍♂️)

What the hell are you talking about, do you even know electrical at all? You do realize most homes never pull anywhere close to 200 amps right?

wow thats going to be a real problem when a subdevision of 100 houses 30 to 50 buy electric cars they will need to rewire entire neighborhoods for the nightmare of ev ever come true especially where undergrown electric wires and who will pay the bills $1.00 kw electric bills in 2030

You did the right thing Randy

RE:garbo. Horizontal looks odd to me (USA). Anybody know why they do it that way?

@@munsters2 that episode is old and regulations have changed I believe now every panel installed in Canada now has to be be vertical.

@@ryans413 OK.

​@@ryans413 there is no code not allowing the panel to be installed horizontally in Canada. For resi applications we cant run any wires in thru the top (service conductors are the only ones allowed there) and that area is closed off to keep a homeowner out. Panels are often mounted horizontally because of this to allow for knockouts in what now becomes the top of the panel. This is why resi is often mounted horizontal and industrial/commercial is often vertical as there is no rule disallowing knockouts in the main lug or main breaker area

This.... I heard that and immediately went "this guy is full of shit, unless its been straight wired without a circuit breaker there is no risk here" because guess what, I do electrical work for a living. Its perfectly acceptable to have a junction box going to multiple uses, its just frowned on as not being professional.

I saw this episode and none of the boxes were accessible they were all hidden behind the drywall

16 amps, not 20. Code is 80% for any continuous load

​@devondenham7309 but receptacles circuits are not continuous loads.

The breaker will hold at 20amps for a long time.

What is "code" in some areas and what is Safe, can be two entirely different things though. It can be not to code and still done safely. Look at 200 ish year old houses that are still standing, not burnt to the ground or blown over.. then some fully "complied with code", houses, or HOTELS, falling over! Clearly code only goes so far.

I guess it depends on what country you are in and how the mains distribution is set up. Here in New Zealand, every house is protected by a 60 A fuse on the pole or pillar box outside. If you short out the service main, it just pops that 60 A fuse and all is good, except it can then cost you a few hundred dollars to have the power company come and fit a new one. If you need more than 60 A supply, you can have a second or third phase connected. Our mains is 230 V (phase to neutral).

Over here (netherlands) we still have dangerous situations like that because of the ban on growing weed. If it wasn't banned, it could just be produced safely in greenhouses like all the rest of our vegetables. Things could be a lot safer but we still have a bunch of particularly dumb politicians and voters blocking any initiative that could lower crime and improve safety. That said, the professional but illegal growers often take some care not to screw up the electrics, because if you burn down the place you won't get any profit either.

@@sw6188 @S W thx for sharing. I love learning how other countries have vastly different electrical systems than the USA. Here in the States, and much of North America as far as I'm aware of, for 99 percent of residential services we use 120V line to neutral, 240 volts line to line, 3 wire single phase, with 200 amps being normal for new construction. The largest I've helped install was 1,000 amps, 120/240V single phase in a multi million dollar home with a couple spa and pool heaters and pumps, a total of eight 6,000 watt quartz heaters, 4 on each outdoor patio levels, and a detached indoor volleyball court. The house was approximately 15,000 square feet if memory serves me right. Here are some exceptions to the rule. Smaller homes built before WWII, with the original service might have 120V 30 amp service, with one hot and neutral from the pole. Some utility companies require any service over a certain amperage, typically more than 600 but it can vary, to be a three phase. Some homes in the southern states may have a high leg delta three phase service if the home had a 5 ton air conditioner in the 1950s or '60s, as some of the earliest outdoor condensers were only available in 240V three phase.

@@Sparky-ww5re I've learned a lot about the US over the years, I have friends living there now and one friend who is from Buffalo who has been living here in NZ for the past 35 years. I didn't know that service main feeds to new installs were 200 amps. I guess you need that much when you are only dealing with 120 volts. Most business premises here are wired with three phase - 400 volts phase to phase and 230 volts any phase to neutral. Houses can have three phase supplied to them as well if they need more power. Many houses in rural areas have either 2 or 3 phase supply as it helps to balance loading on lines that may run for miles before there is another 11 kV step-down transformer. 2 phase supply is the same as 3 phase but one less cable, so there is still 400 volts between phases and 230 between each phase and neutral.

I don't think there is one specifically that says you can't do a tap off of another circuit. We do it all the time in the field to install a new plug or light. What you do want to be careful of is making sure you are not overloading a particular circuit. If we couldn't tap off of circuits, all the wiring in houses would have to be home runs which would be ridiculous. Though, if anyone can find what he's talking about, I, too, would be interested to know.

I can't tell for certain, but I think he is referring to the lighting. Basically, each can light can take 100-200 watts each and they put 12 onto an existing line. So that's 1200-2400 watts of power. For context, a 15-amp line is only 1800 watts. So in other words the lights are pulling as much power as the circuit can handle so they really should have been on their own line. Instead it sounds like they used boxes that already had junction boxes and circuit boxes on them which is a huge no-no that means if you plugged anything into the wall outlet, it could potentially set your house on fire in a worse case. Also if that is the case, as they were saying, these lights are pulling so much power, that they are making a ton of heat, and they covered these lamps in insulation, meaning that the lights could get so hot, they would light the house on fire. So I think that's what they are referring too, also even if the lamps were using the low end of 1200+ watts, when you pull anything close to the load of the wire, the wires will start to get hot. So the wires in the roof were probably getting really hot and warm from all the current draw. Also, junction boxes need to be accessible because you can't tie your wires together and stick them in a wall because they could short. However, in this case, it seems they may have put multiple lines though the same box, meaning that even if you turned the breaker off it would still be live, and if they were tied together in some way, you could have put 30 or more amps on a 15amp wire which definitely would start a fire. So I think they just knew it was out of code. You have to have circuits rated for the expected load and if it's over that then you run a new line, which I think is what they are referring too.

@50Minutes : My goodness, it seems we really do have to tie ourselves in knots to make sense of some of his criticisms.

@@Tindog81476 When was this show released. I imagine it was before LED's became popular. Even a typical residential incandescent bulb was generally between 65 to 70 watts. 200 watt bulbs were rarely used for general lighting, though 100 Watt bulbs were fairly common. But with LEDs, that simply isn't the case. Though, I will give the benefit of the doubt and say this is an older show where LED's weren't common yet. A typical LED 100-watt equivalent draws 15-ish Watts (found on Home Depots website). On a 120 V circuit, 15 amp circuit that is considered a continuous load, you could put 96 bulbs on that circuit. Not that you would, but it is impressive how little LED's draw. In this case, one eighth of an amp, or .125 amps. It's absolutely nutty

@@TheRiddler491 Yes however these are can lights, they aren't the same as regular bulbs, they could be 100-200 watts based on the needs. That's because they need to be more intense to shoot the beam downward. Realize that in even a standard central light fixture, you often put two incandescent bulbs in a fixture (I have seen 3 bulbs too though) so they could be 2X60watt or 2X100watt bulbs. So a typical room light is actually 120-200watts normally even if it's not a can light, so to even produce a similar light to a light fixture you need at least the same watts. The thing with can lights is they could be 20-30 feet in the air, so they have to be brighter due to the Inverse Square Law. What seems to be suggested in the video is they didn't use the correct can light fixtures for the room, so that most likely suggests they used the more energy-intense versions for high ceilings. Again it's unclear what watt bulb they put in these can lights, however, the fact is they still are wrong and the fact you CAN put a 200-watt bulb in these is a huge safety issue. In building construction, you never assume people can't be stupid. I think we can assume these were before LEDs because most newer LED can lights are a lot shorter, as led can lights bulbs are flat, in fact, this style is even hard to find for retrofit, even if the show is modern the fact the owners didn't put it in suggests that this addition is older. And yes, I love LEDs they are AMAZING!! They make things so easy, Christmas lights especially now are so easy to set up you only can run them all off one run to the house and you can run the yard and house off one outlet! Love LEDs.

You can use either one if you use wood primer both sides I would recommend using plastic in bathrooms painting can be a little bit of a problem just go with manufacturers recommend methods hope this helps

Pvc light sand good primer made for pvc paint no problems with rot

Interesting

Pushmatic panels should be completely replaced due to the lack of replacement breakers. If a breaker fails, what do you do …

They still sell replacement pushmatic breakers fyi… they are actually still manufactured. Just not very cost effective

@@dustina6261 - some inspectors like to see the name on the panel match the name in the breaker or they won’t approve (even though the breaker is the matching product). I don’t think the names match with any replacement breaker that you would buy today.

@@stevebabiak6997 who told you this? I am a master electrician and can tell you this is not true at all, are you licensed? no one is even talking about inspections since pushmatic is over 50years old and grandfathered now.... what the truth is the breakers have to be UL listed for use in the panel they go into. New manufactured breakers for pushmatic (branded or not) only fit into those panels and ARE UL listed for that purpose, if you are unsure pull up the UL testing to see how it was certified.

@@dustina6261 - you are correct, I am just saying there are home inspectors who sometimes make up stuff. If I hadn’t encountered that line from a home inspector (but a different panel brand), I wouldn’t repeat it. Home inspectors don’t care that it was grandfathered, they are acting that way because they believe it benefits the buyer they are working for.

Depending were you live you can actually look up at city halls and such to find out if someone has a licensed and such.

Toronto, Canada.

@@SteveW139 Thanks.

I thinks thts only for the main disconnect and it's up to the authority having jurisdiction if your in the states pple always forget that nec is not law it's just bare minimum recommendations that most ahj do adopt but not always

Interesting

its legal in Ontario, where this is filmed.

Yes I was looking to see if anybody else noticed this

Knob and Tube is still king if its intact and has no issues. They Gauge of wire they used on that is insane and is true copper. Intact Knob and Tube if intact is still code in most places.

There is a reason it typically takes 4 years and 8,000 hours of experience, as well as passing a test, to become a journeyman electrician.

@@nachoisme Yeah, but not a valid one---working with electricity isn't rocket science. It does require common sense, though. That 4 years and 8,000 hours should probably be cut in half

@@justsumguy2u OK, so 2 years and 4,000 hours. Master Electricians with 40 years experience still don’t know it all but Ok. You’re right, plenty of things are pretty simple and straightforward but don’t extend yourself beyond what you absolutely know. The people that did the wiring in this video probably thought just like you.

@@nachoisme No, the people in the video didn't educate themselves, and didn't want to learn how to do it right. A simple google search would've helped immensely

You just signed your own death warrant! Never DIY your electrical you can get shocked, you can cause a fire, you can mix up the wires, and you can install the wrong wires and cables Don't Do It!

I have been cursing the builder of my house (built in the mid 90's) for a long time. The electrical looks clean on the surface, but there are issues. The latest was the refrigerator was not on its own dedicated circuit and was shared with the toaster outlet and at least one outlet in the dining room. All labeled kitchen outlets (2), the dish washer, disposal each had their own circuit, but not the refrigerator. We will not talk about the plumbing.

If you have that many sub panels it makes balancing the load way more difficult. Unbalanced loads waste power!

Please don't wire your own house

this clown is so full of himself. I watch the videos for comic relief.

Interesting