[Eric]

My house was built in 1996, i bought it in 2003. Its a nice place and today
i replaced the doorbell button with a decorative thing my wife bought.
Well, when i took off the old button i had about 1 inch of wire sticking
out. There is no more in the wall because the fools who wired it ran the
wire between the siding and the plywood sheathing. I got it done but...
This got me to looking around a little closer at the rest of the house. They
really skimped on the outlets too. Why not put telephone and electrical
near where any possible head of the bed will go (usually only two walls
will be reasonable for bed layout), and on both sides so you can have night
stands where you want? Or how about cable tv on the opposite walls? During
contruction this is so easy and cheap to do, but most places i see are so
poorly planned electrically it just amazes me. Most are just barely code
and a lot are not.
Eric

[John Grabowski]

"Eric" wrote in message
. ..
My house was built in 1996, i bought it in 2003. Its a nice place and
today
i replaced the doorbell button with a decorative thing my wife bought.
Well, when i took off the old button i had about 1 inch of wire sticking
out. There is no more in the wall because the fools who wired it ran the
wire between the siding and the plywood sheathing. I got it done but...
This got me to looking around a little closer at the rest of the house.
They
really skimped on the outlets too. Why not put telephone and electrical
near where any possible head of the bed will go (usually only two walls
will be reasonable for bed layout), and on both sides so you can have
night
stands where you want? Or how about cable tv on the opposite walls? During
contruction this is so easy and cheap to do, but most places i see are so
poorly planned electrically it just amazes me. Most are just barely code
and a lot are not.
Eric


Builders want low bids from their sub-contractors. In order for the subs to
make a decent profit they resort to minimum standards and less experienced
workers who work cheaper. It is a boom for contractors like me who do a lot
of repair work. The only way to get it done right and well is to personally
oversee the design and build of your home.

I'm working with a builder right now on his own new home. He doesn't use me
on his projects for other people because I am too expensive, but for his own
home he doesn't want anyone else to do the electrical work but me and is not
overly concerned about my price.

[Mark Lloyd]

On Sat, 14 Oct 2006 18:55:01 -0700, Eric wrote:

My house was built in 1996, i bought it in 2003. Its a nice place and today
i replaced the doorbell button with a decorative thing my wife bought.
Well, when i took off the old button i had about 1 inch of wire sticking
out. There is no more in the wall because the fools who wired it ran the
wire between the siding and the plywood sheathing. I got it done but...
This got me to looking around a little closer at the rest of the house. They
really skimped on the outlets too. Why not put telephone and electrical

and computer network too

near where any possible head of the bed will go (usually only two walls
will be reasonable for bed layout), and on both sides so you can have night
stands where you want? Or how about cable tv on the opposite walls? During
contruction this is so easy and cheap to do, but most places i see are so
poorly planned electrically it just amazes me. Most are just barely code
and a lot are not.
Eric
--
72 days until the winter solstice celebration

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.laughingsquid.com

"Unlike biological evolution. 'intelligent design' is
not a genuine scientific theory and, therefore, has
no place in the curriculum of our nation's public
school classes." -- Ted Kennedy

[[email protected]]

people want low price, code is ONLY concerned with safety....

Plus standards change sometimes FAST.

If building a new home or have walls open smart folks run empty conduit
to blank covered boxes.

That way new cables can be fished easily as needed

[Edwin Pawlowski]

"John Grabowski" wrote in message
I'm working with a builder right now on his own new home. He doesn't use
me
on his projects for other people because I am too expensive, but for his
own
home he doesn't want anyone else to do the electrical work but me and is
not
overly concerned about my price.


The electrician I use at work does not do residential for the reasons you
describe. All the builders want is cheap. The few houses he will do are
generally high end where people want things done right. Same goes with
plumbing.

Adding all the little niceties that "should" be done, the cost will go up
$2000+ on even a modest home.

[[email protected]]

Eric wrote:
My house was built in 1996, i bought it in 2003. Its a nice place and today
i replaced the doorbell button with a decorative thing my wife bought.
Well, when i took off the old button i had about 1 inch of wire sticking
out.
.. . .
Eric

Welcome to the club Eric. I had that problem last year and had to pull
one board of the cedar siding off plus I have the problem that the
solid wire that they use must be extremely cheap or something. Two
bends, with your hands, of about 90-degrees and it breaks. I've had
problems for years with it. Depending on the weather, sometimes my
doorbell works and sometimes it doesn't.

I have tracked down breaks inside the insulation and fixed it about 3
times, but the problem keeps coming back. To make matters worse, the
transformer, for some unknown reason is located under the sheet-rocked
ceiling in the basement. Why they put it there instead of in the attic
is anybody's guess.

Someday, I'm going to start from scratch and completely rewire the
doorbell. Right now it's working, though, and I keep putting it off
because it's going to be a nasty job.

[mcfriendly]

Do a search for "Wireless Doorbells" - lots of good choices and less
expensive than the time it takes to find the problem.

[David Nebenzahl]

mcfriendly spake thus:

Do a search for "Wireless Doorbells" - lots of good choices and less
expensive than the time it takes to find the problem.

Except that it is possible that one of your neighbors might have one
that uses the same frequency, resulting in your doorbell ringing when
someone pushes their button. These are generally cheap looking and
sounding pieces of crap anyhow; real (hard-wired) doorbells are much better.


--
"In 1964 Barry Goldwater declared: 'Elect me president, and I
will bomb the cities of Vietnam, defoliate the jungles, herd the
population into concentration camps and turn the country into a
wasteland.' But Lyndon Johnson said: 'No! No! No! Don't you dare do
that. Let ME do it.'"

- Characterization (paraphrased) of the 1964 Goldwater/Johnson
presidential race by Professor Irwin Corey, "The World's Foremost
Authority."

[[email protected]]

Wires too short in boxes?

i HAVE ABANDONED BOXES FOR THIS REASON, REMOVE AND DISCARD RECEPTABLE

Install new box nearby and run new lines.......

my dad had a nightmare he had a rental home where the tenant had to be
evicted, 5 months not paying rent......

the idiot tenant stole all the switches and receptables and cut off the
wire too short, he had to rewire the entire home.

tenant also stole all the copper plumbing, so he replaced it with all
plastic..... no resale value....

[mm]

On Sat, 14 Oct 2006 22:14:38 -0400, "John Grabowski"
wrote:


"Eric" wrote in message
...
My house was built in 1996, i bought it in 2003. Its a nice place and
today
i replaced the doorbell button with a decorative thing my wife bought.
Well, when i took off the old button i had about 1 inch of wire sticking
out. There is no more in the wall because the fools who wired it ran the
wire between the siding and the plywood sheathing. I got it done but...
This got me to looking around a little closer at the rest of the house.
They
really skimped on the outlets too. Why not put telephone and electrical
near where any possible head of the bed will go (usually only two walls
will be reasonable for bed layout), and on both sides so you can have
night
stands where you want? Or how about cable tv on the opposite walls? During
contruction this is so easy and cheap to do, but most places i see are so
poorly planned electrically it just amazes me. Most are just barely code
and a lot are not.
Eric


Builders want low bids from their sub-contractors. In order for the subs to
make a decent profit they resort to minimum standards and less experienced
workers who work cheaper. It is a boom for contractors like me who do a lot
of repair work. The only way to get it done right and well is to personally
oversee the design and build of your home.

My ex-girlfriend and her ex-husband built a new house in an expensive
neighborhood, using the builder who build the two model homes at the
start of the quarter mile road. They chose blueprints and then could
make modifications, like a smaller dining room and a bigger kitchen,
and 10 foot ceiling in the basement so he could lift weights.

She thinks this is what ruined her marriage (but I think it was her.)

Every day after work (they met at work and worked together) they would
go see the house and the contractors made one mistake after another
(unlike the model homes which were well made, he told me)

The examples I remember is that they made the power room door open
inwards, so that the door was between the toilet and the sink, and one
could not shut the door to get from the toilet to the sink, unless one
was ready to leave the room. They later made the door open outwards.

And the entryway had its tile down in half the area when they put down
the baseboard. Where the tile was, the baseboard went down to the
tile, and where the tile wasn't the baseboard was put down to the
subfloor.

Every time they found a problem the guy would get upset, but she never
cared. This would be enormously annoying (she did it to me too.) but
he also told me of many other ways she annoyed him. Her first husband
said it was the greatest day of his life the day his divorce from her
was final. There was no adultery on anyone's part, just her being
annoying.

I'm working with a builder right now on his own new home. He doesn't use me
on his projects for other people because I am too expensive, but for his own
home he doesn't want anyone else to do the electrical work but me and is not
overly concerned about my price.