Jim Katen

I'm still unable to understand how the extra fancy bonding (#6 copper) is better than the regular bonding that's been required for this stuff since day one (bonding wire that's the same size as the wire that might energize pipe).

Lightning currents are a different animal.

Marc

Clearly so. But that doesn't explain why the #6 would be any more effective than, say, a #14. Both will do pretty much the same job of reducing the chance of potentials that might cause arcing - even from nearby lightning strikes. (Which is to say that neither will do much.)

I feel the same about the Mercator "cat" knife. Been using it for 30 years.

http://www.worldknives.com/products/mer ... -1120.html

Its lacks some of the old world charm of the Opinel but I prefer its slender profile.

I'm still unable to understand how the extra fancy bonding (#6 copper) is better than the regular bonding that's been required for this stuff since day one (bonding wire that's the same size as the wire that might energize pipe).

Hello all!

This is a great thread and I hope it continues considering there's lots of older homes with this heating system. Anyhow! Getting a bit colder here in Durham so I raised the temperature of the water heater as pointed out to us by previous owners of the house we bought it from. Nifty system but wish ours was set up better in the townhouse (WH in "shed" out back and heat exchanger/blower in closet towards the front). Blah getting sidetracked, I noticed that there was a leak on the bottom of the water heater (State Select WH) and that there was actually water leaking out of it from a panel on the bottom. I've called around and keep getting quoted 1500+ to fix even though from what I've read, it's just a matter of replacing the water heater if there's nothing else wrong with the system right? And yeah it's a big IF and I understand that cheapest is not the best way to go with this considering it's a pretty big part of the house but $1500+ is a big chunk of change...

Find a tech who knows how to work on these systems. Ask him to confirm that the water heater is actually leaking and that you're not just seeing condensate. The ask him to carefully examine the coil at the air handler to see what kind of shape it's in. If it's in good shape and the water heater is really leaking, then get a new tank installed. $1,500 installed seems a tad high, but not a whole lot.

Are the walls framed with wood?

If so, the wood framing should either be PT, or more than 6" above the soil.

317.1(5)

I see more old Rheems than any other brand.

My 1992 American is still going strong. I just changed the dip tube and anode rod a couple of months ago.

I did some pruning of this thread to remove personal and belligerent comments. Please keep it civil, folks. This isn't IN.

If Hearthman's barb "As for what I'm proposing I thought I typed in English" is okay, why ain't the others?

I thought what he proposed was idiotic, and way over-the-top - and didn't say so until he took a stab at Kurt. I can't say that here? Heck, is this turning into an ASHI forum?

Yes, Erby, I have made idiotic comments before on this and other forums. I will go to confession and do my penance; cross my fingers and hope to die. I will also accept and learn, and have accepted and learned from, any/all criticisms here.

There's a line between prickly and belligerent. I let the prickly sarcastic comment remain because it was part of his answer to Kurt's reasonable question.

I trim things when they become personal and tedious or when they devolve into chest thumping.

Disagreements and debate are welcome and encouraged, just don't make it personal.

I did some pruning of this thread to remove personal and belligerent comments. Please keep it civil, folks. This isn't IN.

If you ever use the NAHB Residential Construction Performance Guidelines, it will be handy to have a 32" level.

. . . Anyone seen the late model Bosch DW's with the plastic hex box and cord thing that goes in an adjacent cabinet? It looks like a better way to make the electrical connections.

I saw one a few days ago, but the box was square not hex (?). It looks like a good system.

Well Jim, if you take a CO certification course you would learn otherwise. Besides, with CO being essentially neutral buoyancy, the stack effect causes warm air to rise up carrying CO with it. This has been proven time and time again by researchers and combustion analysis practitioners. There is a case proving this from Japan called "Suicide in Sendai". A guy in a high rise tried to kill himself in the basement using CO. It failed but did rise up many floors killing an old lady many floors up. It is also my general experience.

I agree entirely about CO having neutral buoyancy and the stack effect when CO is warm and said as much in my post. I hope that there's no question about the fact that warm gases rise and that, when first produced, CO readings will be higher in the upper parts of a house.

My point is that, as it cools, CO dissipates and with time the stack effect becomes irrelevant. Once mixed in the indoor air, the CO does not settle out again.

Perfect timing on this question as I'm about to add a disposal to a house that does not have one. Every house we have owned has NM kind of lying like this BX. I have always gone in and at least attached it to the back wall of the cabinet kind of like the dishwasher drain high loop.

As I'm doing it from scratch, what is actually correct? BX?

To follow up on Kurt's question, is the switch the disconnect?

As Marc said, use SO cord with a plug and plug it into a switched receptacle on the wall. The cord will survive the challenging environment under the sink and the plug will serve as a disconnect.

In order to qualify as a disconnect, a switch has to be within line-of-sight of the disposal.

. . . and they should be installed between knee and face heights where your mouth is breathing whether standing or sleeping. CO will slowly rise through the house so usually the highest readings are at the top of the house--not down low. . . .

I disagree. Air has a specific gravity of 1.0, while carbon monoxide is .96 - the same as nitrogen. Gases that have such close weights don't stratify in a typical household environment. If they did, carbon dioxide, which has a specific gravity of 1.5, would pool on the floor and we'd suffocate if we were to lie there.

Carbon monoxide tends to rise initially, only because it's typically produced by combustion and it's hot at first. After a short time, it effectively disburses throughout the space.

This may be the answer. Powder Coat for Buss Bars

Those are insulating coatings.

HI's, or anyone else. That's not a bad reason. It's actually a pretty good reason.

I mostly asked because I am curious. Why wouldn't one tell folks to take out old K&T wiring?

It could be intensive therefore expensive labour not really accomplishing anything. A few abandoned wires strung through ceiling joists and partly buried in insulation, who cares?

The next home inspector, and the one after that, and the one after that. . .

Certainly if there is a fear that the old wire could become re-enrgized, or if it wasn't bypassed properly, sure, remove it.

That fear is present on every house with abandoned wires.

I can't count the number of times that voltage sniffers have lied to me.

I've had many false positives but never, ever a false negative.

I get lots more false positives, but I've had some great false negatives. The best was a cable hanging from the ceiling in a basement. The agent was standing next to me and asked, "Is that live?" I pulled out the voltage sniffer, which remained obstinately unresponsive as I ran it along the length of the cable, and I said, "The volt sniffer says it's dead. . ." Now before I could complete the sentence (which I had intended to say, ". . . but you can never trust these things), she reached out and grabbed the live end of the wire.

Try to remember to bring a voltage sniffer into the attic on an older house like that. The ceiling fixtures especially on the first floor are often left on the K&T wiring, because the sparky doesn't want to break thru lath and plaster to string new cable. . .

I can't count the number of times that voltage sniffers have lied to me.

That's what I thought. I also thought there was something in the electrical code indicating old abandoned wiring had to be removed.

Sadly, there is not.

If it's new construction it's a disaster, but I've not found major issues with this situation in old buildings.

Old growth lumber, the generally loose nature of construction (drafty, easy vapor transmission), minimal to no vapor retarders to retain moisture, etc., make for few problems related to condensation. That's my experience anyway.

I'm reasonably sure there's some condensation in there somewhere, but I'd tend to doubt it would be a big problem.

I agree. Older houses are very forgiving of this kind of thing. The spaces between those sheathing boards allowed for ample ventilation when they were covered with wood shingles. Even now, with plywood and asphalt shingles, there are so many holes and gaps up there that it's like a sieve.

The packing of insulation in the rafter bays is wrong, but in a house like this it never seems to cause anything bad to happen.

As for the knob & tube, I've started recommending that they have an electrician remove all of it, even when it's no longer energized. For one thing, it often turns out that it really is still energized. It also causes confusion in the future. I've been surprised to find that people are actually having it removed.

Here are the bullet points that I always try to hit:

* Describe what it is and make sure that they understand that there's no perimeter concrete footing or foundation.

* It's an obsolete foundation system that was, generally, abandoned 100 years ago.

* It's going to perform poorly during an earthquake, even when compared to other homes of the same age that have perimeter foundations.

* Many lenders won't lone on a house with this kind of foundation.

If there's not physically enough room for me to get everywhere, I recommend excavating the crawlspace to make enough room, and calling for a re-inspection. These things *always* have damage in the areas that I can't get to.

. . . I know, nothing to go on here, but what have you seen in your travels?

In 1978 I was working on a large building that had a street running through its lower level. A bunch of conduits ran underground below the street, and terminated in the basement of each building. My job was to figure out which conduit was which so that we could then pull the appropriate wires through them. When I uncapped one of the conduits, water gushed out as if someone had opened a hose bib. No water appeared out of the other end of this same conduit, in the building across the street, but the water continued to flow for days. It never stopped. We just abandoned that conduit and sealed it up again. Never did figure out what was going on.

It's more about what the wire will handle, not what you plug into it. All of the outlets and switches have to be rated for 20 amp on a 12g wire with a 20amp breaker.

As long as there are two or more receptacles on the circuit, you can use 15-amp or 20-amp receptacles on a 20-amp circuit. Check out 210.21(B)(3).

Switches are a little more tricky. If their loads are fixed, then they only need to be sized for the load that they control. If they control receptacles, then they should be sized to match the breaker that feeds the circuit. Check out 404.14(A) and (F).

. . . Most of the electric ranges I see are on 30 or 40 amp breakers. I see 50's occasionally. I believe that the range should have been on a 40 amp and like what was suggested above someone ran the microwave receptacle off the range feed. Now that I've slept a little bit that's what my money is on.

Thank you gentleman!

The next time you see a normal-size range installed with a 30-amp breaker, check the kw rating on the range nameplate. I suspect that the breaker (and maybe the wires) will be undersized. Most ranges need 40-amp circuits. Many of them, with warming zones, warming drawers, and convection fans draw well above 40 amps and should be on 50-amp circuits.

As for your theory, if the microwave were tapped off the range feed, why didn't it die when the breaker tripped?

I had one just like that several weeks ago. The problem had nothing to do with flashings. They solved it by reinstalling the vent so that it sloped slightly toward the exterior.

It sounds like the only problem with the bamboo product you like is that you're concerned with the process of replacing sections of it in the future.

If that's the case, you can always build a jig and use a router to hog out any damaged sections with no risk of damage to the subfloor or to adjacent strips.