What do you recommend? Broken wire!

hellothere123

Made an oops on the weekend.

1) I drilled through the ground and neutral on 14/2 wire...black hot is perfect. This line comes directly from the panel to an outlet and is in the floor joists. I just had enough to connect the neutral and ground with a merrett (sp?).

I know it is best to replace the entire run - but i would have to tear apart the drywall on the entire wall to rerun this line.

Is it ok to cut the line, put 2 electrical boxes in, with a 14/2 running from one to the other? This area will be exposed through drop ceiling.

2) Also on another joist i just slightly nicked the outside coating of a neutral wire, less than 1mm nick...Am I able to just tape this up with electrical tape?

I live in Canada as code may vary.

Thanks!

Leah Frances

Good job to give us your location. I'm only familiar with NEC so I'll keep my mouth shut. Hard lesson for knowing where your lines are before you drill. Sorry.

__________________
If I could only remember to THINK about what I was doing before I did it.

tcleve4911

I think the 2 boxes work if they are accessible through the dropped ceiling.
The nicked wire ....tear out the other half of the house....

They'll be along shortly to quote the National Electric code book for ya.....

teamo

Is it ok to cut the line, put 2 electrical boxes in, with a 14/2 running from one to the other? This area will be exposed through drop ceiling.

You can put in two electrical boxes and run a line between them as long as they are accessible. You can use 14/2 if that is what you have there now.

Leah Frances

Cleve - you're right about both things - And it is a good thing that someone does tell us what we're supposed to do.

__________________
If I could only remember to THINK about what I was doing before I did it.

Red Squirrel

Yep I'd just go with two boxes. Sure beats rerunning otherwise perfectly good wire. you are adding more potential failure points, but when's the last time a marette let go on you? As long as they are accessible you are good to go. I always like placing a box assuming I will need to go back to it at some point. While the odds of a wire letting go is quite slim if it's done right, it can happen, or you may potentially want to tap into it at some point depending on what the circuit is for.

hellothere123

ThaNKS for the info:

I'll just tape up the neutral that I nicked.

And I'll try to get enough slack to put the broken neutral and ground into one box...if not, then I'll put in the 2 boxes and jumper them across.

We'd all like to be Mike Holmes and remove everything if we see a screw in the wrong spot - but things gotta get done - as long as they are safe.


And I'll take a bit more time before I drill...just a few seconds here and there actually saves time - imagine that!

J. V.

And what do you recommend we use instead of the NEC?

tcleve4911

Hey JV
Sorry if my bad joke offended you.
It was not a slam at NEC or you or anybody.
I will be more mindful of what I post in the future.

Tom