[10492]

The story doesn't state where the fault current was coming from.

He had to have something that was bad, plugged in somewhere.

 

[10492]

look at the diagram the hot and neutral are reversed

I didn't see the hot nuetral were reversed..........cheers

However it still brings up questions, see below.

It wasn't fault current, it was normal neutral current that was using the audio cable shield as a parallel path.

I've seen something very similar happen with an RS-232 connection where it actually burned up.

I see it, but with the reversed wiring of the receptacle, the current flowing on the shield, would be what ever resistance of the shield is, no?

That's a BS story.

I tend to agree.

Most laptops have a 2 wire connection, and don't use the ground. Same with phone chargers. If he had a two wire laptop, how could this happen?

He states the electrician connected the ground to the neutral wire, but there is no mention of him or whoever connected the wires up wrong in the jbox to begin with.

My take is this:

The author knows nothing about mixing equipment, and found out the hard way, why DIY websites are bad news. He tried, or had his friend try, to install new receptacles in his house, thinking he knew what he was doing, and burned up some stuff. He made the story up about an licensed electrician doing it, to make him feel better, and to share his story.


IMO....

 

[10492]

And why would someone plug their laptop in, in the studio room, and then run a usb cable into the kitchen where the fridge is, where he plugged in his new printer? Why is it there? Who puts their printer in the kitchen, by the fridge?

I dunno....

If one receptacle in the studio had the wrong wires connected in the j-boxes, one could assume that all of them are the same way, if it's a 100 yrs old, and he didn't touch anything...

Something seems fishy.....

 

[10492]

My father is a licensed appliance repairman

Yup, he did it, and made up the licensed electrician.

 

[10492]

Still gotta question the wire to the receps, if you don't mind?

It's a house, over a hundred years old, with knob and tube wiring, with no ground with the wires, the color of the neutral wire had faded, and the junction box from long ago, had the wrong wires connected to it. This is what the electrician didn't know, because he didn't look for a miswired J-box?

I am close?

 

[10492]

Old K&T wiring had all black insulation. The hot was black, the neutral was black, and there was no safety ground. To make it even more confusing, many times the (black) neutral was run to the switch for the lights. So unless you compared the voltage to an earth ground, it was really easy to get confused.

Later K&T wiring was sort of gray (neutral) and black (hot), but after 80 years of oxidation, everything looks like the same color. Again, it's very easy to get the hot and neutral reversed when connecting to K&T.

Of course, it's a code violation to do any sort of bootleg ground, or to tie into open K&T wiring at all. And you're supposed to convert any 2-wire receptacles to a 3-wire GFCI with an unconnected ground screw. Since a GFCI doesn't require a ground wire to operate at all, then the consumer is safe from shock. However, the receptacle is supposed to be marked as "No Ground" but I've never seen one marked like that other than my own installs. Maybe I haven't been looking hard enough.

Just how do you guys deal with "upgrades" to grounded receptacles in old buildings?

Mike Sokol
[email protected]

Kinda figured that was the case. You see, old K&T was aluminum, and never that I've seen, was in a j-box. The electricians who installed it soldered splices and wrapped them with a friction tape. It was quite the skill to wrap and solder K&T back then.

Now that we know there was no J-box, and aluminum wiring someone was playing with, this begs the question.....how did you create a bootleg from aluminum to copper wire.

While you point out an interesting dilema on paper, it s clear to me, this actual problem never happened the way it was explained. It seems you two created a problem on paper...in theory..and then wrote up a solution for some reason.

Don't feel bad about it. Manufacturers who brought up the AFCI stuff did the same thing. First they found a problem on paper, then created a solution, and then forced everyone to believe them with their "err on the side of safety BS".


You should write an article on how the electrician who you blamed this problem on, used standard wire nuts to splice the K&T to copper pigtails, and how that burnt your studio down.


Cheers.