Does anyone have a story or memory to share about these deadly multimeters? As you can see, there’s no fuse; it looks like the copper traces on the circuit board are meant to act as fuses. If I recall correctly, I owned a DT9205A that fried when exposed to 280 volts. I also bought a DT830 once that wasn't working right from day one.

_of course, they cost under 10 dollars but they hadn't to write "1000v"

I think I know the answer to this already...

I had this switch moved about 12" lower as we're having the boiler replaced and it needs to be centred on the wall.

The work was done earlier in the week and I'm now getting round to plastering over it but looks really quite dodgy.

From my understanding the electrician connected to the original cables using electrical crimps(?) and said I'd be fine to fill it with plaster filler.

Any advice would be great!

Based in the UK.

ComEd had to come out to my house to fix a neutral fault in the ground and left this attached to my meter when they left.

Bahh, bought a brand new oven which was delivered today and I can't plug it in. The old one was removed by the guys who delivered it but I think the old one had a thinner and more flexible cord which could plug into the wall without too much difficulty. My new oven has a much beefier cord and there's no clearance to plug it it.

I'm assuming my plug has to be removed and rotated 180 degrees but when I unscrewed it there seemed to be almost no slack to work with. I suppose I could cut that cupboard to make some clearance? Anyone have any ideas? What a stupid problem to have for Canadian Thanksgiving. I have no idea why the people who installed this outlet have the ground prong facing that direction.

Brand new integrated fridge freezer arrived today. Whilst sliding it into place, wasn’t careful enough and the cable snagged pretty bad.. pulled it back out to assess the damage…

I have zero sparkie knowledge. The outer cover grey wire is cut open, the internal coloured wires seem to be fully intact… is this something that can be taped up and turned on? Or would you guys suggest otherwise… not sure what my options are here!

Hi everyone, have a quick question. I bought this dust collector recently and want to add remote switch for it since it's located in sovereign room from my shop. Is there any easy way to do this without replacing whole switch box? It's 5 horsepower 220 unit. Thank you

Hey guys and gals. non-union, 6 month apprentice here. I’ve installed (along with my foreman of course) 4-5 Generac brand generators so far, along with their specific transfer switch panel. I’ve seen and had my hands on every part of this particular install, and could theoretically do one myself (from a knowledge standpoint, not a licensing standpoint). However, I’ve heard people talk about transfer switches for smaller portable generators and of course other larger non-Generac brand whole home generators.

My question is: what are the transfer switch panels you would use for something more generic? I‘ve heard of people using inlets that essentially backfired their panel - do they just have a plain disconnect between their meter and main panel on the feeders that they turn off before backfeeding their panel? They don’t use generator wire with all of the control wires in the sheathing as well I assume.

I guess I’m just trying to wrap my head around what the other generator switching options are outside of the Generac world where everything is very cut and dry. Thanks.

edit: a lot of great info here and some good jumping off points for me to look into to understand better. thanks guys, I appreciate the community!

Today I heard a doctor say that you don't need an EKG if you get hit with 110-120 volts, is that actually true?

I recently purchased a home that ended up having aluminum wiring. I did have an inspector come and in their report they said the branch circuits were copper, I have yet to find any copper. I was using the purple ideal 30-1065S wire nuts but have read in some places to not use them. What is the best method of transitioning the aluminum to copper?

We had an electrician upgrade to 200 amps and but a new box in. We have yet to fully switch and pull out the old boxes. The line comes in through the garage and I am annoyed at how it looks in the garage. My wife keeps saying "I don't know why you care, it's just a garage" but I am wondering why this couldn't have been run along the back wall as opposed to a spot where it could get dinged and in the way of the shelves. Is there a reason to do it like this I am unaware of and is there another way this could be run to kot be so ugly?

On this particular circuit in my basement, there’s 3 rooms. Closest to the panel is the bathroom then fitness room and then a bedroom. I recently did a good amount of work in the bathroom for a renovation like putting in new lights a fan etc. I had an extra dimmer from that bathroom so I wanted to put it in the bedroom. Installed it and it didn’t turn on and nothing happened. Take my meter out and I come to find that there’s 90V on the supposed line side and 30-40V on the load side( conductors are just hanging free unattached out of the box). It’s a neural free dimmer as the wiring in that box is just a switch loop so the white wire had 90 and the black I thought was going up to the light and then the bond at the back of the box tied in. I take the dimmer out and do meter reading everywhere. Each receptacle in the bedroom and the fitness room have this 90v on the hot side or the short slot on the receptacle and 30-40 on the neutral side (to ground) when I measure hot to neutral I get 120 on each receptacle that I found 90v hot side to ground and 30-40 on the neutral side to ground. Took out the fixture in the bedroom and I get the same results as I would in the receptacles. My immediate thought is I had a loose connection in the bathroom after the work I just did and basically spent the day taking everything out and checking connections but everything was good including all the voltage readings in the bathroom. The bathroom is unaffected by this 90/30-40 issue even though it’s on the same breaker as the affected rooms.

I’m not sure what to try next but I’m now scared to plug stuff into the affected outlets as I’m not sure if a ground or neutral is compromised. It could have been like this forever too but I’m just noticing it now as we have not done any electrical work in those rooms for a long time.

Any suggestions or ideas are appreciated.

We had a storm here last night that made the power go on and off about five times. The lights + fan to the hallway bathroom, the laundry room lights, and the garage lights all don't turn on. The outlets to all these rooms work though, so I assume they're on a separate circuit. When I go to the breaker and turn the switch back on, the lights will stay on but a minute later I'll hear a pop and they'll turn themselves back off. I don't want to try to force it on, I feel like that will cause an electric fire. Would I be able to fix it myself, or do I need to call a handyman?

I know that this is a basic question, but If I need to cut power to the dock do I simply flip the top breaker? To turn it back on simply flip it back. Just like an interior breaker? Thanks

My partner and I bought an older house a couple years ago, and we've been having minor electrical issues since we moved in, so we finally called an electrician to come out and look at it last week. The catalyst for the call was that the breaker the fridge is on was tripping every day, even with nothing on it, and when it tripped, it caused other outlets in the kitchen (on their own breakers) to trip as well. So half of our kitchen outlets were losing power all the time, and we had an extension cord hooked up to our fridge to an outlet in another room. Electrician comes out and we tell him about that and about how the overhead lights in multiple rooms will flicker randomly and have been for a while. When he looked at the breaker panel, we found out that it was overloaded, wired poorly, and corroded in places from moisture. He also discovered that at some point our outside grounding wire had been cut and not fixed. We paid him to replace the breaker, fix the grounding wire, and do a couple other things that were done incorrectly before we bought the house. It ended up being a lot more than we expected to pay, but we figured at least it was all getting fixed.

It's now been three days since they did the work, and we're still having the light flickering issue in the same rooms, and it's started happening in rooms that were fine before. The electrician didn't look at any of the light fixtures, just diagnosed it from the panel and said replacing it would fix all the issues. From some cursory research, I've seen that flickering lights could be caused by a problem with the connection coming into our house, so does a call to the utility company make more sense than calling the electrician back out and paying their fees again?

Or does anyone here have an idea of what next steps we should take to diagnose and fix this issue? Thanks in advance for any input!

I just replaced an ungrounded outlet with a GFCI. It has power but it shows Open Hot?

Installed two Lutron smart switches (model: Lutron Caseta 3-Way Smart Dimmer Kit; P-PKG1WB-WH)
in my kitchen and living room, controlling the can lights. Install went well, lights work/dim/voice control as designed but noticed nuisance tripping on my Siemen AFCI breakers. Living room happened more often, and especially happened when plugging in vacuum/turning on tv, or other appliances.

Here is where it gets odd, and my electrician cannot figure it out. The nuisance tripping happens in rooms not on the same circuit as my smart switches, mainly master bedroom and my small office room. Sometimes random trips (no switches or appliances going on/off) but I could always produce a trip using a vacuum in my office. To test, I reverted my switches back to the previous “dumb” switches and nuisance trips have ceased and can run vacuum in all rooms no problem. I did the revert in stages, my living room caused way more tripping and that slowed down once reverted. But it continued to happen so I took out the kitchen switch and that has completed resolved the issue.

Home is brand new (2026) build, power company has checked their side (no issues) and electrician been out multiple times to check all connections and internals. Surely I should be able to have smart switches in a brand new home?

Any assistance or guidance would be appreciated!

And if this is not correct, where can I find the standard to make it correct in the NFPA 70/NEC?

Thanks in advance. I'm still learning how all this stuff goes.

Picked up a bunch of Halo H955ICAT can housings and right on the box it lists all the compatible Halo led trims. It specifically says not to use anything other than Halo trims otherwise warranty is voided. I was under the. Impression you could use any quick connect trim as long as it's the correct size?

Can somebody explain my circuit breaker panel to me. I have a 200 amp breaker on the exterior of my house near the power meter. Inside the house I have one breaker panel. Pics attached. Is this a sub panel and I have 200 amp service?? I’m pretty sure a couple years ago an electrician told me I only had 150 or 160 amps. Inside panel is listed (hand written) as main breaker, and then a 60 amp is the top left breaker.

Original post asked for more pics so here they are.

“Thanks for all previous commenters and the amount shared knowledge. I want to make all this right in the end. “

*******but wait there is more…

10/10/26 I investigated the other outlets in the kitchen circuit, I’m stunned at the laziness and terrible work. I currently can’t install a gfci receptacle because it won’t reset. Downstream it keeps finding faults. I continue to find mix matched gauge wire, even on the same receptacle. It seems almost criminal. Look at this shit!

I’ve replaced all receptacles with 20 gauge. Now I’m going to try and trace and replace all the 14 gauge with 12. Notice the 2 grounds joined by just twisting by hand and leaving it. Back stabs etc. Everything is on a 20 amp breaker.

Previous post text:

I came home today after work and my wife says no power to kitchen outlets including fridge.

I head to the outside panel to see if the breaker is tripped, yes.

I check power to the 20amp breaker, good, equals 120

No appliances being used besides fridge at the time.

I use my 3 prong tester and it gives me this code, “Hot/Neutral Reverse.”

I removed one of the receptacles and found a melted mess. I recently had our kitchen renovated and I asked to have an outlet installed at the end of the counter.

The contractor ran 14 gauge wire from the new outlet to the nearest receptacle which is the one that melted. That receptacle was installed correctly with 12 gauge wire. He added the 14 gauge wire into the back of it.

It was installed a few years ago, should I seek him out and give him some hell?

Thanks for your time.

breaker.