More Breaker Box Routlette

I would like to go back in time and ask the people who wired my house a few questions:

1. Why do I have two double gang switch boxes that are each fed by two different breakers?

2. Why does one circuit feed two outlets in the living room and the GFCI for the microwave in the kitchen, yet another circuit feeds two more outlets in the living room?

3. Why is the panel labeling complete gibberish?

I spent much more time today than I should have replacing four outlets in the living room because I couldn't find the breakers that fed them. I have one more outlet to replace out there, and yet again I'll have to play breaker roulette to get it shut off.

I do better with pictures. Here's what I'm dealing with.

We have this gun-shaped room. (We live in Idaho; every house has a gun-shaped room.) Red shows outlets on one circuit, green another, and yellow yet another. The purple represents two outlets for which I have yet to identify a breaker and an overhead light, also whose breaker is unidentified at the moment. I have to find the purple circuit so I can replace one of the outlets, which is so old and worn out it won't hold a plug anymore.

Problem is the other purple outlet I replaced previously, but I didn't mark down which breaker it was. I'm now making a complex diagram, of which this picture will be a part.

Today, I Was An Electrician

Today's adventure: Lots of switches. And a few outlets.

Michelle is painting the entry and living room. For the entry at least that meant moving from almond-colored switches and such to white. Which is just as well, as a few of the switches were showing their age.

As you can see in the picture, the boxes were sunk into the wall as well. That meant yet another trip to Home Depot for box extenders, but I figured since I had the boxes apart, doing them right was the best thing.

I did get one shock -- working in a switch box I forgot was fed by two breakers.

And I displayed my typical lack of brain in another box -- also fed by two breakers -- when I got frustrated that one of the switches wasn't working until I noticed I hadn't turned the second breaker back on. And I still had the wiring screwed up, since I jiggered with the wiring before I noticed the breaker thing.

I also put in a new light fixture, replacing one that I noticed was broken when I took it down, so also a good thing. The new one:

Got a few shots of Michelle painting, this time in the stairwell:

Everything I know about sketchy scaffolding I learned from Dad and Albert, and applied it here copiously. Note I am not on the scaffold I built -- but it did work, and we'll reassemble things for the second coat tomorrow.

Not to be outdone, Isaac helped me with my breaker wiring diagram:

For those not paying attention, he got his addition from this:

Got to go about 11:02 for the joke. Then pull the plug.

And about 9:46 for the tractor beam joke.

Closing in on the Floor

This is always an exciting part of tile laying to me -- getting the fringe and end bits installed once the main floor is put in. That's risky, because I have to make sure the pieces fit before I get all excited with the thinset, but in this case, it's worked.

I did run into two boo-boos, one of which you can see in the lower right of the photo. I had to clean the thinset off the floor and out of the spot because the fitment wasn't as right as I was hoping. But I am very close to having the floor ready for grouting. Exciting times.

And yes I love playing with tape. The tape patches on the fringe tile helped me get the right tile in the right spot, and the trapezoid showed me where it was safe to stand. As you can see, this is a small bathroom but the diamond pattern we opted for made laying the floor a lot more complicated, but I think we'll be happy with the end result.

Tile Job Started . . . NOW

Finally started on the bathroom tile today. It's going to be tricky going due to the pattern we've picked. And the walls aren't necessarily 90 degrees to each other, so there'll be some finagling along the walls and corners. Not too much I don't think. Also, it's important that I keep the lines as straight as I can.

Hoping I can get it finished next weekend. Getting started was the big obstacle, but now that I've got it started, it should go easier. I also managed to use up some old thinset I had, so I won't have any old stuff lying around anymore. I've got to keep things going because I've got a lot of work to do to get this bathroom pulled together. I'm really ready for a basement toilet again.

That's a Lotta Holes, Son

So more than a year ago I bought a coil of ethernet cable for some random projects around the house, the biggest being stringing some wire from our solar power controller on the north side of the house to where our router is on the south side of the house.

I was rearranging some things in the study today and decided today was the day.

And man do I suck at snaking wire.

I had hoped to use some speaker wire that was in the ceiling already to pull the new cable through, but that wire was really stuck. So I went to the old standby, poking holes in the walls so I could fish the cable through.

I did succeed in getting the wire mostly snaked -- I have to finish by getting it from the pantry into the crawlspace under the bathroom and then out the side of the house toward the power controller. Then I have to actually get the solar power company to come and connect the cabling, since I'm not allowed to poke the innards of the device.

 

Tester Tested

More than a decade ago, as part of a furnace installation in our basement, I ran some ethernet cable through the ceiling in the study so I could have a wired connection between my printer and the computer.

A few years ago things stopped working, shortly after I hung some pictures, so I thought I'd skewered the cable with a nail.

Tonight I decided it was time to pull that cable and in the process snake a new one through the wall. But it also gave me an opportunity to test the nifty cable tester I got for Christmas.

I plugged things in and the tester told me the cable was good.

Not believing the lying tester, I turned off the wifi on my computer, plugged the cable into it and into the network switch I'm installing, and the cable worked just fine.

So there's less cable snaking I have to do as I build the network. Pretty cool.

And wow, the camera on my phone is terrible.

[Selects "Poop Alone"]

 

The door to the master bathroom has been sticking off and on for years, most recently when temperatures jumped from the single digits to melting overnight.

I changed the hinges Monday night, thinking that would fix the problem, as I have been able to fix it in the past by tightening screws and tinkering with the hinges, but changing the hinges made it worse.

I got my level on the frame and found out the top is really slanty. So tonight I sanded the door a bit on top and got it back in its hole. It's no longer a rectangle, but it closes.

LIGHT!

The shattering of a little glass (I knocked a picture off the wall), a quick whiff of ozone and the new light in the study blazes forth an unparalleled glory.

Casting weird shadows everywhere. I may have to adjust things.

And you can see I got the lighting of the lamp from A Christmas Story scrolling so I could make sure I got the line right.

No Longer Flickering

You may recall a month or two ago my shenanigans of trying to fix the flickering LED light fixture we have in our basement. I reattached wiring. I got rid of excess wiring. I replaced switches. Nothing worked.

I can report today a tentative victory: We have replaced the light fixture. And it's twin. So they'll match.

I hope the fix lasts.

Yes, riveting photo of the cardboard boxes that held the new lights. But a photo of the installed lights would be just as exciting. Ignore the broken banister behind the boxes; that's on my list of things to do, possibly this summer. I'm dragging my feet on that because the stairs themselves need replacing or extensive repair -- whoever installed the carpet on them nailed the carpet to the treads, with horseshoe nails -- and I'm not sure I'm up to that yet.

The Stupid Project is Done

It's done. I don't want to think about it any more. I'm tired of seeing it.

But I do think it turned out great. The paint job is temporary because I'm out of the color for the wall, and my wife isn't all that smitten with the color anyway, so we may be painting in the near future. or the far future. All I know is that it's a lot better-looking water shutoff portal than what we started with.

The washer hanging out on the ledge is what opens the little door.

Also, a friend said the setup reminds him of this, which makes me feel a little better:

And Part Three

Now, part three.

Almost done. I need to prime and paint, then install the door. It'll be nice to have this one behind me.

Michelle's not quite smitten with the pop-out look, but it's something I had to do to make it all look more finished. I think it's turned out great.

Fixing the Hole in the Wall, Part 2

Back on Dec. 13,  I made a hole in the wall in an attempt to stop mice from coming into the craft room.

Today, as the pictures show, I began in earnest to fix the hole. It's been a bit more complicated than I hoped, but I think we'll end up with a better-looking water shutoff access (and I'm sure that's the first time that sentence has evern been written on this planet) than what we started with.

Part of the problem is the piping for the water connection is a bit too far from the wall. They put in a 2x6 wall because this was built as an all-electric house, but even then the pipe and its insulation intruded enough into the room that it couldn't be concealed. So I built a little box, using a piece of pine first used in the first ever Troop 1010 Klondike Derby sled, so the pipe and its insulation are behind the wall. It's a popout of about two inches, which isn't perfect, but I think it'll look a lot better in the end.

I have to let this first coat of plaster dry, then I'll sand it, put on another coat, sand again, then texture and paint. I'd like to think I can have it all done by the weekend.

Fixing the Hole in the Wall

The mouse in the house is no more.

And of course it decided to go into Michelle's craft room and sniff around and find her hidden chocolate and eat it and leave little poops all over the place.

We tried the old-fashoned snap traps, but he was too clever for them. Also too clever for the bucket traps Michelle used in her commissary days until she got some thin-enough wire.

The snap traps did almost catch one of the dogs, however . . .

Now the mouse is, as they kinda say in Dutch, a doya verdomde ding -- a forlorn dead thing, if Dad is to be believed, and as he was Dutch, probably the only thing off is my spelling.

Now I'm busy fixing the hole he likely came in - this open area around our water shutoff valve. I've sealed every hole I can find and added a bit more insulation, as this has always been a cold spot in the wall. Hopefully this stops the critters from getting in.

I'm going to shrink the opening here and I've ordered a little metal door from Home Depot that should arrive on Monday, so all of that should make the spot look and function a lot better than the bigger hole and the furnace vent cover over it.

Verdict: Still Flickering

While we have nice, new light switches and a few new switch plates, we also still have a flickering light in the basement.

What to do?

I talked today with an electrician in our ward, and he figures the light driver is broken and the light should be replaced. I'm game to do so, but it's still a bit infuriating, as these lights aren't all that old.

A few more things I may try first:

1. Check the connections in the fixture. Might have a loose connection. Or I might still have it wired to a bit of wiring that goes to a light that is no longer serviced by that particular bit of wire.

2. Replace the breaker. I'm less sure this will do anything, but as it's less expensive than replacing the fixture, and there's a good chance I won't be able to find a fixture that'll match the twin in the same room.

A little disappointed that replacing the switches didn't work, but I'm not sad I did it -- the switches were original equipment with the house and the plastic on some of them was a bit brittle, so to have new switches in the wall is fine, and I'm only out the time spent in replacing them.

The light *is* flickering less, however. It still is flickering, though.

It's not quite this bad, but I am getting to the point I want to knock Mr. Waturi's artificial testicles off his desk.

STOP THE DAMN FLICKERING

On advice of electrical counsel, I'll be replacing two three-way switches in the basement to see if they will help our LED lights from randomly flickering.

We've been dealing with random flickering in our basement lights pretty much since I put them in a few years ago. For a long while, it was one fixture that would randomly flicker, then stop for a while, then flicker again. Now that one seems to behave nicely but the other one has picked up the habit, and I can't explain it. We finally asked a friend of ours who studied as an electrical engineer, and she suggested the switches might be the problem. It's possible -- the switches in the wall have been there since the house was built in the mid-80s, and I'm pretty sure I've replaced just about every electrical outlet in the house because they were just worn out. Maybe the same thing has happened to the switches. I hope that solves the problem, because it's been a real pain.

WE HAVE STAIRS!

I'm calling the steps done. I mean, I need to sand and stain them. I should probably install some kind of railing as that's what code calls for. And while I have cleaned up most of the mess, there's still mess to deal with.

The dogs, however . . . I can talk Daisy into using them, especially if there's a bird or squirrel to deal with. Dottie, however, just stands inside the door not sure what to do because the STAIRS WERE GONE and now there are NEW STAIRS and it appears she doesn't know how to use them anymore. Maybe it's muscle memory playing big. Hoping that changes, as I'm tired of hauling them up and down the stairs. And finding their poop in the house because they're too scared of the new steps to poop while they're outside.

Mending . . .

First box is mended.

I may regret not buying a manifold to replace this old one, as with the old one I was not able to use the quick release attachments as they were the wrong size. But part of me is a bit tired of throwing money at this project.

The gravel in the bottom is a bonus from a previous project. Hopefully it'll make things look a little cleaner until the bugs move it.

Second box is being more of a challenge. I'm dealing with an odd configuration of pipes (two valves without a manifold) and some really rusted hardware.

I've got one valve out, with the other getting buried a bit as I work. The ground is so dry . . . but we do live in a desert, after all. Also had a lot of root intrusion from the nearby apricot tree. Guess I should have expected that after a decade, but seeing that inch-thick root snaking by one of the valves was startling.

I was going to go out and work on it today, but nah. I need some rest. Also, I have to get ready to go to Island Park tomorrow night to replace the stupid water pump in the camper . . .

Sprinklers Continue to Break

Apparently, this is my Summer of Sprinklers: The Revenge.

In the first few years after we moved into this house, my brother and I worked to install a sprinkler system. It's been a nice way to have the lawns watered automatically nigh these many years.

Then this year came.

I was late getting sprinklers started -- didn't get them tested until the first week of June. I identified some problems with some circuits in the front yard, and worked to repair those.

In the meantime we had a freeze -- not uncommon for our neck of the woods this time of year -- and it blitzed several circuits in the back yard. So I've spent many hours this past week digging up valves and lines, replacing valves, and meeting some success in getting things working again. I'm hoping with what I did today and what I'll accomplish maybe tomorrow -- it's ox in the mire time -- or next weekend will see everything set right. In the meantime, I've been dragging hoses all over the place and the lawn looks like a missile testing site. Here's to getting things up and running and having a better summer from here on out.

 

Vicarious Tinkering

I possess very little mechanical aptitude. I can use tools and such, but if you asked me to put something mechanical together (unless it has specific LEGO-style instructions and all the parts are new and shiny) I will not succeed.

So it boggles the mind that I've spent some quality time watching this guy disassemble and reassemble various parts on various cars.

This all started a few weeks ago when the starter on my Honda Pilot gave up the ghost. I toyed with the idea of replacing the starter myself and found a YouTube video in which some guy from Orem replaced his. I did, in the end, chicken out and after toying with the idea of having my adept nephew come to help me, ended up having the car towed to the mechanic. (Still the best $89 I've spent in the last few months.)

Nevertheless, I continued watching such videos because part of me is intrigued by the skill it takes to disassemble and reassemble something. I certainly don't have the specialist tools, but to watch it is to watch skill and training in action.

Also, this guy has a pretty laid back, easygoing manner that makes his videos well worth watching.

It might have been fun to see my own car being worked on. And I won't take the Honda's starter for granted. At least for a while yet. (Keep wondering what's going to happen next; so far this year we're replaced the starter, alternator, and battery.)

Project Progress, and A New Project Found

Made some progress today. Not enough -- we had a pretty good windstorm blow in about 4 pm that meant shoving a lot of the stuff back into the garage without order. Messy, messy, messy, as Professor Hinkle would say. I've got more shelves to put up next to the recycling bins, and more in the corner past the door. That might give me enough room for tools, camp gear, and the stuff Michelle wants to move out of the craft room. We'll see.

Also noted, a leak in the garage roof, revealed by the storm blowing in from the north. A rarity here, but still something that'll have to be dealt with. That'll suck. But it's got to be done.