Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Home Theatre/basement

Mission accomplished.

Realized that I'd be a shoe-in for a Darwin Award if I electrocuted myself... "Green Helmet" (Health and Safety Officer) electrocutes himself working on live circuit... so I killed the power.

I would seriously like to slap whoever did the electrical work before me.

- Neither fixture box was correctly attached to the framing (those little tabby things on the sides aren't for spiking the box into the wall, they're there as feelers so the box hangs the correct 1/2" past the framing for drywall)
- If'n ya don't NEED 3 conductors, don't be usin' 3 conductors and making me guess while I'm stripping it to test it whether or not that red wire you've bent back on itself and electrical taped is, in fact, live.
- These are outdoor fixtures. Ground everything in sight that isn't a hot. Pigtail the ground to the box to the butterfly (fixture strap) to the fixture.
- Machine screws are for metal, wood screws are for wood, since the box is metal, don't attach a butterfly to the box with wood screws.

(end rant)

Bren R.

At least you had framing. I went into a box to tighten up the mounting screws and found it wasn't mounted to anything... because there were no studs in the wall.

The drywall was fastened at top and bottom, and there were "flat" 2x4s at the drywall joints holding the two pieces of drywall in alignment and sorta-kinda nailed to the top and bottom plates. We had never leaned against the wall -- I think aggressive dusting would have gone through the drywall.

That must be an Ontario thing... saw that on Holmes on Homes in the GTA once too.

I dunno... if I'm going to do something myself, it's either because I want the challenge, or to do a better/more conscientious job than a contractor will.

Only once was it to circumvent "code"... put in a laundry sink that was 4" further away from a vent stack than is allowed by code. As far as I was concerned, the sink could drain onto the floor and run down the sewer. The trap doesn't siphon empty, all runs fine - I understand why the code is there, I just chose to ignore it in this one case... better than the $1500 quote I got for routing a vent.

Bren R.

>>That must be an Ontario thing...

Could be... the previous house was just as bad... it had real studs but some of them only went down to a few inches off the floor for about an 8 foot section. I was trying to figure out why the baseboards kept falling off

Dude, not trying to hijack the post, but I really liked your CD mix. A few of the songs were a little to much punk for me, but I made it through them fine. I liked the heavier stuff a lot, and was on the floor laughing my ass off at Mickey's Hank Williams Jr. remake of Scum F**k Tradition, funny as [censored]

Thanks again,

Randy

Glad you liked the CD.

Not many around here with similar tastes in music as me, so I didn't have to send out too many.

Bren R.