House was built in 1960, some of the wiring is still original, or close to it. Some of it has been updated by various tenants through the decades, with some less than professional methods at times. It's ahh... yeah, a bit janky to say the least.
@nogoodwithnames My house was built in the 19th century, luckily my landlord updated it in the 2000's. The electrical in these old 1800's Boston houses can be sketchy.
@KDemo The house I grew up in had a couple of mercury bulb switches in it still. Those were cool and you could get them to buzz if you turned them on very slowly and stopped at just the right spot.
@duodec Mine doesn't exactly buzz, it's more like a crackle. House was built about 1950 - the kitchen had been remodeled, but not sure about the electrical system.
Lets see... I've got lights that buzz, switches that don't open circuits, an entire wall of the house where the outlets all had the hot leg left open, a ceiling fan light that dims when the mini fridge kicks on, one light switch with a loose connection, one light fixture I can't even use because it has decided it wants to be a strobe, a loose wire on the doorbell button, a few burned or physically broken outlets, one yet-undiagnosed non-functional switch/light fixture, and a completely unlabeled breaker box that I've been able to figure out about half of. The fact that almost nothing is grounded doesn't even register with me.
LED and other will-last-many-years type expensive bulbs do not work well w/ wiring that is mostly updated but w/ older fixtures.( at least my experience) Basically you try to do the right thing and buy them and then they burn out fast. Is it one big scam ? Or do they really last long if you have a just built home ?
I think the previous owners upgraded from knob and tube with the cheapest electrician they could find. They only put in a 100A panel which is already full, didn't label anything, and the Hulk punched holes in the drywall to install the outlets so there's huge gaps around all of them and they're loose in the boxes. Old houses are great!
I live in an old house and from time to time the microwave will trip the circuit breaker. Figured out some of my basement outlets are on the kitchen breaker which is where I have my chest freezer and basement entertainment system plugged in. Crazy how overtime electricians just plug stuff into the breaker panel with little thought... "Old houses are great!"
Pretty poor. Living room has a section of weak ground, a section of no ground, no ground in bedroom, incredibly weak ground in bathroom. Kitchen seems fine. Pretty noisy lines all around.
I dunno, after multiple close lightning strikes. I just replaced the TV and am looking to replace my Receiver... 5.1 silence. Thank God my PS3 1st gen. is still okay. I thought it was dead, but both the HDMI input to the old TV and the audio in the receiver were blown. Hooked up to the new TV, it works! :-)
1969 home, have a HD TV with assorted items, 3 desktop computers running Boinc when not being used all on the same circuit and the circuit breaker only occasionally trips when running an air conditioner with all the lights on in the hottest days of summer.
So compared to the above I guess the electrical system is pretty good.
1972 home, Modern enough for circuit breakers over fuse box. All outlets are grounded. Last owners added outlets in garage, those have the polarity reversed. Now if I run the computer, monitor, electric oil heater, washer and dryer it trips the circuit. I'm planning to separate the computer room on it's own circuit to eliminate that minor hitch (happens more often then it should). Pretty solid otherwise. That's why I paid above average for the home as it was one of the newest (by like 100 years) in the town.
1926 building. When this building was sold about ten years ago the old owners had to upgrade from fuses to circuit breakers. The fuses used to blow frequently. There were three fuse boxes, one in the apartment, one in the narrow, dark corridor underneath the house and one Top Secret Fuse Box that contained a master fuse that controlled the whole apartment which I only learned about when I lost power one Christmas Day (I hadn't put up any Christmas decorations). I've never tripped any of the circuit breakers. The challenge is living with such a tiny number of outlets.
1885 home, which works out nicely because they didn't put any of what was presumably incredibly scary and awful electrical that went around in the 1890s.
Big trees used to knock the power out at just about any storm, but it seems the city's done some sort of redundancy coverage, so there's just 1 second blackouts before it kicks back on.
1940's vintage, spool and tube wiring that was never upgraded. Circuit breaker panel with circuit breaker form factors that cannot be found any more. Three 220v appliances wired to a single breaker (supposed to be individual breakers for each appliance). All two prong outlets. GFI? I laugh.
Mine functions well, but still needs updates. It's on the neverending list of shit to do on our home.
No friggin' idea how bad my home's electrical is. But it inconceivably manages to make inexplainable noises.
Truly is a game of Tesla Roulette.
@pepsiwine
House was built in 1960, some of the wiring is still original, or close to it. Some of it has been updated by various tenants through the decades, with some less than professional methods at times. It's ahh... yeah, a bit janky to say the least.
@nogoodwithnames 1959. Same boat. Some of the fixes here are downright ridiculous
@nogoodwithnames My house was built in the 19th century, luckily my landlord updated it in the 2000's. The electrical in these old 1800's Boston houses can be sketchy.
I have to jiggle the switch to turn the kitchen light on.
@KDemo The house I grew up in had a couple of mercury bulb switches in it still. Those were cool and you could get them to buzz if you turned them on very slowly and stopped at just the right spot.
@KDemo Hey! Me too!
@duodec Mine doesn't exactly buzz, it's more like a crackle. House was built about 1950 - the kitchen had been remodeled, but not sure about the electrical system.
@duodec You also have to install them right side up or they don't work.
@walarney We didn't install it but it was installed right side up. I wish I'd nabbed the switch when my parents sold the place.
Our townhouse was wired by union electricians. So we had to have it fixed twice, and then correct some GFCI mis-wiring later.
So far so good. Things only dim a little when the AC kicks on; otherwise its fine.
Lets see... I've got lights that buzz, switches that don't open circuits, an entire wall of the house where the outlets all had the hot leg left open, a ceiling fan light that dims when the mini fridge kicks on, one light switch with a loose connection, one light fixture I can't even use because it has decided it wants to be a strobe, a loose wire on the doorbell button, a few burned or physically broken outlets, one yet-undiagnosed non-functional switch/light fixture, and a completely unlabeled breaker box that I've been able to figure out about half of. The fact that almost nothing is grounded doesn't even register with me.
@Kleineleh - Sounds like some of us should be sure to keep fresh batteries in our smoke detectors.
@KDemo This poll actually reminded me I need to go buy more 9 volts
LED and other will-last-many-years type expensive bulbs do not work well w/ wiring that is mostly updated but w/ older fixtures.( at least my experience)
Basically you try to do the right thing and buy them and then they burn out fast. Is it one big scam ? Or do they really last long if you have a just built home ?
@ceagee Bookmark and come back in 10 years and I'll let you know how many times i needed to change my lights.
@MrMark I'll leave that to you ! you can just @ me.
@ceagee fairly new place here, no led failures thus far (2 years in , and they are all cree glass bulbs)
Apparently good enough to allow use of a powerline-over-ethernet device (which also provides WiFi).
I think the previous owners upgraded from knob and tube with the cheapest electrician they could find. They only put in a 100A panel which is already full, didn't label anything, and the Hulk punched holes in the drywall to install the outlets so there's huge gaps around all of them and they're loose in the boxes. Old houses are great!
I live in an old house and from time to time the microwave will trip the circuit breaker. Figured out some of my basement outlets are on the kitchen breaker which is where I have my chest freezer and basement entertainment system plugged in. Crazy how overtime electricians just plug stuff into the breaker panel with little thought... "Old houses are great!"
Pretty poor. Living room has a section of weak ground, a section of no ground, no ground in bedroom, incredibly weak ground in bathroom. Kitchen seems fine. Pretty noisy lines all around.
I dunno, after multiple close lightning strikes. I just replaced the TV and am looking to replace my Receiver... 5.1 silence. Thank God my PS3 1st gen. is still okay. I thought it was dead, but both the HDMI input to the old TV and the audio in the receiver were blown. Hooked up to the new TV, it works! :-)
1969 home, have a HD TV with assorted items, 3 desktop computers running Boinc when not being used all on the same circuit and the circuit breaker only occasionally trips when running an air conditioner with all the lights on in the hottest days of summer.
So compared to the above I guess the electrical system is pretty good.
1972 home, Modern enough for circuit breakers over fuse box. All outlets are grounded. Last owners added outlets in garage, those have the polarity reversed. Now if I run the computer, monitor, electric oil heater, washer and dryer it trips the circuit. I'm planning to separate the computer room on it's own circuit to eliminate that minor hitch (happens more often then it should). Pretty solid otherwise. That's why I paid above average for the home as it was one of the newest (by like 100 years) in the town.
1926 building. When this building was sold about ten years ago the old owners had to upgrade from fuses to circuit breakers. The fuses used to blow frequently. There were three fuse boxes, one in the apartment, one in the narrow, dark corridor underneath the house and one Top Secret Fuse Box that contained a master fuse that controlled the whole apartment which I only learned about when I lost power one Christmas Day (I hadn't put up any Christmas decorations). I've never tripped any of the circuit breakers. The challenge is living with such a tiny number of outlets.
1885 home, which works out nicely because they didn't put any of what was presumably incredibly scary and awful electrical that went around in the 1890s.
Big trees used to knock the power out at just about any storm, but it seems the city's done some sort of redundancy coverage, so there's just 1 second blackouts before it kicks back on.
@dave I just learned last night Texas has its own power grid. The rest of the US has 2.
1940's vintage, spool and tube wiring that was never upgraded. Circuit breaker panel with circuit breaker form factors that cannot be found any more. Three 220v appliances wired to a single breaker (supposed to be individual breakers for each appliance). All two prong outlets. GFI? I laugh.