Our friends' daughter bought a house a few weeks ago, and her dad asked if I'd change out the old light fixtures, switches, and receptacles. Of course, no problem.
But wow, are we ever finding some weird stuff.
The original plaster-and-lath walls have been covered with drywall, and, on at least one outside wall, there's also a layer of a soft fibrous sheathing under the drywall.
In a few cases they've added an electrical box just by cutting a hole in the wall and using wood screws in hopes of hitting the lath. Blah!
In another case they ran a 3-conductor cable off a ganged double breaker to a kitchen receptacle, but didn't split the receptacle. But that didn't trip the breaker, because one of the conductors is dead. There must be an intermediate connection missing. Oy ...
But here's the best one so far ... at some point someone enlarged the doorway into the kitchen, and relocated the cables creatively:
They were embedded in the cement for the old ceramic floor tiles.
And how did they enter the wall?
They were run up the outside stud a ways before entering the wall cavity, and covered with drywall and lots of mud.
Inside the wall cavity, they were spliced to cables running up to switches, in an octagon box floating in free space, dangling from the cables.
Bonus: The two cables are on separate circuits - so turning off the one breaker does not kill everything in the junction box, nor at the two switches above, which are in a double rectangular box.
It's been interesting for sure.
But wow, are we ever finding some weird stuff.
The original plaster-and-lath walls have been covered with drywall, and, on at least one outside wall, there's also a layer of a soft fibrous sheathing under the drywall.
In a few cases they've added an electrical box just by cutting a hole in the wall and using wood screws in hopes of hitting the lath. Blah!
In another case they ran a 3-conductor cable off a ganged double breaker to a kitchen receptacle, but didn't split the receptacle. But that didn't trip the breaker, because one of the conductors is dead. There must be an intermediate connection missing. Oy ...
But here's the best one so far ... at some point someone enlarged the doorway into the kitchen, and relocated the cables creatively:
They were embedded in the cement for the old ceramic floor tiles.
And how did they enter the wall?
They were run up the outside stud a ways before entering the wall cavity, and covered with drywall and lots of mud.
Inside the wall cavity, they were spliced to cables running up to switches, in an octagon box floating in free space, dangling from the cables.
Bonus: The two cables are on separate circuits - so turning off the one breaker does not kill everything in the junction box, nor at the two switches above, which are in a double rectangular box.
It's been interesting for sure.
