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Tracking down a ground fault on a 1970s split level in Tucson that ate 11 hours of my Saturday
Last weekend I got called to a house on Kelso St where the bedroom breaker kept tripping every time it rained, and I figured it was a quick fix. Turns out a previous homeowner had spliced a romex run behind a closet wall with no box, just wire nuts taped up, and moisture from a roof leak was soaking the whole thing. I poked around with my meter for a good 4 hours before I gave up and started pulling drywall, and the actual bad splice was buried under 8 inches of blown in insulation. Two bags of insulation, one new junction box, and a lot of shop vac time later it held steady at 0.2 megohms. Has anyone run into a hidden splice that obvious before, or do you guys just start pulling walls sooner?
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finleym3728d ago
Running into a taped up splice behind a wall is almost always a remodel guy who didn't want to cut in a box. Now I just megohm the circuit first and if it reads bad, I start opening walls at the obvious spots like closets and any place the drywall looks patched. Blown in insulation hides everything, so a cheap tone tracer helps you follow the run before you cut. That 0.2 megohm reading after the fix is solid, good work getting it dried out and boxed right.
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