Very true, you never know. I have discovered both of the wires live, due to miswiring in a 4 gang box where all the wires came together for a bank of switches. I have also seen neutral wires, especially from 50's wiring (horrible sheathing), where a wire was stapled with an uninsulated staple too tight (using uninsulated staples in the first place is a mistake). Any ways, the wire was arcing in the panel, and that circuit had to be replaced. I would say about 75% of the job is fixing the last guys mistakes.
Oh boy, this is going to be good, lol. I remember a dishwasher line run through a hole in the floor, the insulation was almost gone, it was a ticking time bomb.
The cords powering computer equipment usually are a very small wire size to cut down in cost, a fuse internally protects the equipment but the cords protection is left for the 15 or 20 A circuit breaker. Thiner than 14 AWG should not be used for house wiring over 15A. Now the 6 ft cords smaller than 14 AWG are able to handle the equipments current draw usually of 2-3 Amps, the fan you are powering is probably drawing less than 1/2 an amp, so there are no issues with the cord, if that fan goes ban without fusing it it can start a fire due to the circuit breaker not tripping. A dead short usually will turn the circuit breaker off. To be 100% safe you need fan fusing at 0.5 Amps and a cord 14 AWG. To be practical and realistic, you are fineunder normal circumstances that cord will never get hot with the current the fan will draw. My fans are not fused and i depend on the circuit breaker to trip if there are problems
really appreciate it! It's nice to see people like you offering advice like this. You don't know how many electricians I had called that wanted to charge me to come look at it to make sure it was safe. I feel much more at ease with your input.
Glad to be of helpAwesome!! Thanks so much for the input Sparky
any time
About $50-$100 an hour depending on the guy, plus materials.
Good question
lets say the tank equipment including lighting at 1KW, I would settle for the basics, a circulation pump 150 to 300 w for a large one, some lighting 500w and misc at 200 w so 1 kw is ok. Now for the appliances, refrigerator 1000 to 1500w big ones 220v at 2kw, kook top forget about it 3 to 6kw, AC depends, with all that said I will split into 2 categories. Just aquarium at 1000 to 1500w and house at 15kw and up to 150kw. We installed 250 kw in a house in Miami Beach, it depends on the load. So a 15 k will run you approximately 5k with installation approx 8-10 $k including an ATS automatic transfer switch.
Don't get me wrong, you do have emergency power and a plan, for 2 to 3 days you need something stronger.In all honesty though I've never had to use my generator and it's been six years since I've installed the manual transfer switch. Most of my power outages are 2 to 4 hours so I use one of these bad boys and just plug in one of my MP40's. It's actually a handy little gadget, I use it for camping, airing up tires, jump starting vehicles and much more, at about $100 it's a great deal.
Most people in Miami with portable generatos have the same MTS
Do you want the service upgraded? Panel service is about $100 an hour plus materials. You are looking at maybe 6 hours total labor, a square D 100A panel runs about 50 bucks, so not too bad on that. Upgrading the service is about $2000 if you needed that.Can you give me a rough idea on price (I realize it will be very rough) on changing out a breaker panel/box (materials included). I've got a federal pacific stab lock load center and she is full. I want to add a couple dedicated circuits to the fish room and split up some of the existing circuits (I realize this is a wiring thing so don't worry about this) to prevent overload on existing circuits. I'm just looking for a rough idea to see if this is in my budget or if I'd have to starve for a year to do it. Here's the current box:
Thank you in advance.
change the panel, they don't trip. Federal used to be #1, in all schools police stations etc, before square d became the best panel you can get, anyway everyone paid top $ for federal ................and there were a bunch of fires that this company was responsible for. Ge makes breakers that fit in that panel and they are safe. Cost to change a panel is about $ 800 and for a 200A complete service upgrade like anemone said 2k. Change it.
I would just have your whole house re wired, but that would be a few grand. Like I said, a new 100A panel will be materials plus about $600, or more. With a sub panel, maybe a few more hours, so up to $900 to replace your old one, and run a sub panel.
