Just had a big hole dug in my front yard

   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard #161  
No. The circuit tracer just locates the breaker connected to a particular circuit.
Here is what you need to do since you seem to know just enough to be a danger to yourself and possibly others as well when it comes to wiring.
Shut off the power to your entire electrical panel. Take off the cover and IF you know what breaker/breakers control the circuit in question remove the breaker from the panel and connect the two wires at the breaker together and then use the ohm meter at the receptacle, wall switch or wherever those wires end up to verify with the meter that you have a complete circuit. Once you have the circuit verified separate the wires that attach to the breaker and see if the circuit is now broken at the meter. You need to trace out each pair of wires, hot, neutral, (and ground too) at each circuit and breaker in question to make sure the wiring methods are not messed up. If you feel you're in over your head, you probably are and should consult with a qualified electrician, or at the very least buy a good quality book on basic wiring methods and study it thoroughly before touching any wiring. Otherwise you could burn down your house and everyone in it.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard
  • Thread Starter
#162  
No. The circuit tracer just locates the breaker connected to a particular circuit.
Here is what you need to do since you seem to know just enough to be a danger to yourself and possibly others as well when it comes to wiring.
Shut off the power to your entire electrical panel. Take off the cover and IF you know what breaker/breakers control the circuit in question remove the breaker from the panel and connect the two wires at the breaker together and then use the ohm meter at the receptacle, wall switch or wherever those wires end up to verify with the meter that you have a complete circuit. Once you have the circuit verified separate the wires that attach to the breaker and see if the circuit is now broken at the meter. You need to trace out each pair of wires, hot, neutral, (and ground too) at each circuit and breaker in question to make sure the wiring methods are not messed up. If you feel you're in over your head, you probably are and should consult with a qualified electrician, or at the very least buy a good quality book on basic wiring methods and study it thoroughly before touching any wiring. Otherwise you could burn down your house and everyone in it.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Coyote. I have a book on electric wiring, and I've been gradually upgrading stuff on this house for 7 years now. The electrical inspector stopped by a week ago to check my progress on the new wiring and commented repeatedly how impressed she was at the quality of workmanship.

As I mentioned before the problem with troubleshooting these two circuits is that they are both somehow interconnected. I did not cause this problem. This is left over wiring from 1953.

I appreciate your comments, and please keep them coming. I had stated already that I plan to disconnect every receptacle on both circuits and work through each wire until I can get a good schematic of the system. Help me understand what I am missing. What are you suggesting that I do differently than this?
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard #163  
Its hard to say what you need to do next because you don't know what the person who wired the circuits in question did originally.
As I've already said, you can do best to either hire a pro to trace out that particular circuit and learn from what they do, or you can attempt to do it yourself with the panel shut down; hoping to map out the circuit as you go from panel to switch to light socket, (or whatever is on the circuit), until you figure out what was done.
I don't doubt you are doing a fine job of renovating- but that is vastly different than tracing out an old, buried in the walls, possibly erroneously wired circuit(s). I'm saying in essence that there is no loss of pride in knowing when to turn to a pro for their expertise, read experience, in helping troubleshoot a single circuit. It will be money well spend and your house will be safer as a result. My 2 cents:thumbsup:
My own situation is, as a example- I can do wiring myself but am slow at it because I don't do it on a regular basis. For about 8 years now I've had a local electrician working for me wiring my addition, new barn, flip house etc. It leaves me free to run the various projects as my own GC, and I know if I have a problem it will be corrected. And I know it is all done to code by a master electrician. On the other hand, it has cost a small fortune by anyone's standards to pay for the work.:(
Good luck, be safe. Post back results.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard
  • Thread Starter
#164  
Success!

We started at 7:00 this morning and we're just getting done at 10:00 tonight. We took Coyote's advice and mapped the circuits with the breakers off. My wife used an Ohm meter, and I'd rub wires together until we knew which were which.

All we found was one set of wires in a light box that led off to nowhere. I left it disconnected, and both circuits work great now. We re-did 9 outlets and added 4 for a total of 13 that I wired today. We pulled new wire such that 11 of the 13 are now grounded with new wire and everything. The other two are covered with a GFCI circuit because they are next to the kitchen sink. Both lights are still the old wiring, but they connect to the new circuits.

That was one of the most satisfying feelings I've had in a long time when I flipped on the last breaker and everything worked. Thanks for the encouragement, everyone.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard #167  
Awesome work Iplayfarmer! Now you should take the Misses out to a nice dinner after that little exercise in patience.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard
  • Thread Starter
#168  
Awesome work Iplayfarmer! Now you should take the Misses out to a nice dinner after that little exercise in patience.

She was a huge help! Of course she's been telling me all day today how nice all the new switches and outlets are.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard
  • Thread Starter
#169  
Brief update...

The electrical work has been put on hold due to the holidays. Some of you may have seen my thread about insulation. I'm going through the debate in my head whether to have someone blow in insulation or install batts myself.

In the mean time, this weekend I finished installing the flexible ducts for my ventilation fans. I had already installed the ducts for the bathroom vent fan and for the dryer. This weekend I installed the duct for the vent fan in the salon. We decided to install one to extract the noxious perm fumes.

My sheetrock guy came by to give me some pointers on the framing. There were a few wall junctions where I hadn't provided him a way to attach sheetrock in the corners. One 2X4 and about 45 minutes are all I'll need to fix it right. I just need to make the time to do it.

On another note, I think I found where the "wires to nowhere" go. There was an old doorbell transformer that hasn't worked since before we bought the house. The light box in question is the closest thing to that transformer. It makes sense that the wires would go there.
 
   / Just had a big hole dug in my front yard
  • Thread Starter
#170  
I took some more time over the Holiday weekend and did more electrical work. I re-wired the upstairs bathroom and the dining room. I went from a single outlet in the bathroom that only worked when the light was on to 3 separate double receptacle outlets (6 times the outlets I had!!). I added GFCI protection to the bathroom and split the light and fan into two switches. I added three outlets and re-wired one of the two in the dining room. I also pulled new wire in from the breaker box for the circuits I had previously done. I have been tying the new wires into old cloth stuff as a temporary measure until I could get all the wires pulled in from the box at once. I now have a bone fide grounded outlet for my computer! :)

Something else I did in the bathroom was to go from a 24" X 24" surface mounted medicine cabinet to a 36" X 30" recessed cabinet. The new cabinet is very nice! It was a bear to fit it in, though. I had to move wires, pipes, and re-frame that section of wall. My wife swears it was worth it, but she didn't have to do all the work.

The end is in sight. I have one more bedroom to re-wire and few leftover outlets in the living room. After that I'm going to add two switched outlets to the new porch for Christmas lights, and I'm on to insulation and then drywall.
 

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