Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Gotta love DIY electricians.

So I have to do some upgrades in my well pump house. Went to kill the power at the disconnect, all the circuits didn’t shut off? Well seems somebody thought it was a good idea to run a 110 circuit for an electrical outlet, pump contractor and the control box off the top lug of the disconnect 😳



Only breaker protecting that circuit is a 220 75 ft away. So now I got to move that and put a weather proof GFI in for the outlet. Fuggers.

How'd you get stuck with that abortion??

Is there even a neutral in that box or did the wizard that wired in the 110 recp use the 220 circuits ground to make it sorta work?

Typically a 220 pump circuit is two hots and a ground, no neutral involved.


It looks pretty suspicious right there..

We used to call it a brother-in-law special.

Just a modified UPS!

Had a retrofit job on a house... electric heat was all run 110, multiple circuits run through all sorts of boxes randomly, multiple outlets with no wire in the box...

Our first house had a 12x20 shed out back with one outlet and pull chainlight. They ran the power from the hvac outdoor disconnect.

I had the shed moved so had to unhook electricity. I literally pulled the wire out of the ground with my bare hands, I guess they laid it there and let grass grow over it. Dont know how I never messed it up aerating, etc...

It’s 2 hots and a ground, it’s hard wired in the garage with 2 10 solids and a ground but they used romex from a j box to the pump shed. Problem is they didn’t mark the romex neutral where I normally put black tape. No worry, I will just pull the romex out.

Check for pennies in those fuse sockets.

Good idea, just makes your chore easier.

Just like water……….only different 😳

People are often shocked when they find out I am a bad electrician.

About fifty years ago I went to work for a small company. I wanted a saw installed and wired it in. A couple days later the boss leaned up against the metal wall and instantly jumped away. He asked,
"Did you wire that saw in?"
"Yea. I figured I could speed up our chopping process," I responded.
"Well here we normally hire an electrician. Check this wall."
You can guess, I got shocked also.

I think I can top that. The dipschit we bought our house from was real proud of all the repairs and remodeling he did which consisted of everything being halfassed and wrong with the cheapest parts and supplies. He hardlined the dishwasher into the cabinet by drilling 6 schitty overlapping holes with a 3 inch hole saw from the basement to make an access to the underside of it and ran copper pipe straight to it. That was fun to undo to get the dishwasher pulled out and replaced.

Now the fun one and I still don't understand this one. Our sink disposal is 220 and eventually needed replaced so I opened the cabinet to get started on it. He took 2 lines of 110, one coming from a switch and another that was hard wired into the breaker box (with no breaker) and spliced them together. So it always had 110 going to it at all times, even when we had to stick our hand down in it to remove a spoon or whatever. How or why it didn't buzz or hum is beyond me.

If you think that's bad,how about some a-hole wiring 3-phase with a hi-leg using four red wires or four black wires.

Never buy a house from an electrician....ask me how I know.

Lol he was a retired farmer who thought he was an electrician. I fixed all his mistakes in the garage except 1. He pulled the feed wires off the main lugs in the meter box, No breaker/disconnect, the knife switch and contacts are corroded as are the plug fuse sockets. Lovely. Used that box to add a sub panel then moved all the wiring to breakers. Still need to remove that box and make it right.
Got all the wire and pipe so all that BS romex is going bye bye.



Been on that end too unfortunately. Not fun.

I have wired up four log houses and I live in one of them. Never had a problem.
Log cabins are twice as hard to wire as framed structures.

The Residential Electrical Code is not that complicated.

Seen a lot of that chit in 50 years. Amazing more homes don't burn down

Worst I ever saw was on a remodel we did in the early 70s.
Homeowner wired his own house.
He ran a wire thru the studs and just tapped on the receptacles as he went. Just scraped the wires looped around and used friction tape.
One circuit has #12-#14-#10-#6 range cable all spliced together in the walls.
Light over the card table with 2-150watt bulbs was switch legged with door bell wire.
All circuits had 30 amp fuses.

My first house (cabin) had all the wiring made up of short scrap pieces of the old fabric type wire spliced together with cloth friction tape, no wire nuts. Water lines were rusty galvanized, and the "leech field" was a 3" clay pipe going straight under the yard about 20 feet. I picked it over another that had no well or septic.