On Monday, September 28, 2015 at 9:47:23 AM UTC-4, trader_4 wrote:
On Monday, September 28, 2015 at 8:36:00 AM UTC-4, DerbyDad03 wrote:
I spent the weekend helping my Dad prepare his house to be put on the market.

One of the tasks was to remove the light fixtures from a bathroom. After
removing the fixtures themselves, I was left with the mounting plates shown
in the following picture.

http://i440.photobucket.com/albums/q...pssjkqsr1x.jpg

When I removed the plates I found that the electrical boxes were not attached
to the studs, instead they were attached directly to the back of mounting
plates using a threaded tube and strap, similar to this setup:

http://i111.photobucket.com/albums/n...j/DSC03039.jpg

The threaded tube came through a hole in the center of the mounting plate
and was secured with a nut. The mounting plates themselves were screwed
through the wallboard into a stud. Obviously, when I removed the plates, the
electrical boxes came out with them.

Is this an acceptable method of installation?


It looks like the fixtures were intended to
be installed that way, they had knockouts to accept the cable or
conduit connector and space for the wiring junction to be made.
If it was not acceptable, seems odd the fixture would have been
designed and listed that way.

The holes where the wires came through were actually rimmed with a brass
ring to prevent the steel from damaging the insulation. I don't recall that
that there were knockouts for conduit connectors. Romex connectors were used
in the box itself.

The hole for the threaded tube was dead center, but we don't know that that
meant the box did not need to be secured. It may simply have meant that the
plate could easily be mounted to the box, not vice-versa.

In addition, we don't really know if it was "listed" to be installed that
way. I was removing the fixtures, not installing them, so I don't have
instructions to refer to.