DIY Home Improvement Forum banner

Electrical Cleanup and Code

6K views 18 replies 10 participants last post by  sixspeed 
#1 ·
Ok so first time poster here. First let me say I realize there are some things I should not do myself. However the majority of what I want and need to do I can handle. I just want help doing it as safely as possible and make sure it's to code. Next let me state that I checked with my city and they go by 2008 NEC code.

This is all in a house I just bought. So my questions are:

1) What are the issues with wiring in my basement being ran together in the corner underneath the joists like this?











2) What's the best way to go about cleaning it up?

3) From other posts I think I can rerun wires like this below directly through the joist across the air flow. It's just a return.



4) this is the one that I'm fuzzy on. This is a regular duct and a few are touching it and some are not. Is this against code and if so, how should I rerun it?





5) Finally this is similar to the first one but runs along the main brave through the middle of the basement ceiling.

Thanks and any help is appreciated.
 
See less See more
4
#11 · (Edited)
If an inspector were inclined he could probably argue 'poor workmanship' as addressed in the NEC to require a cleanup of what you have shown. At any rate it needs to be cleaned up and a few code violations corrected. I like what Electures posted as a good way to secure the romex cables.

In general the NEC requires bored holes to be 1 1/4 inches from the face of framing members to avoid any nail penetrations if ceiling or walls are ever finished. If not then nail plates are required on the face to prevent a nail from being driven in that location. 4ft is the distance before a staple or other support is required for the nm b in most cases. It would be hard to cover every possibilty and exception. Common sense helps.....:)

If your cold air returns are joist cavities enclosed for that purpose by duct metal on the bottom faces of those joists you can pass perpendicular thru them with your nm. I just would not get to crazy passing multiple cables thru a single cold air return. Some inspectors do not like it period. Be careful of bundling multiple cables with wire ties. I'm not a fan of stackers but they do offer nice spacing of the cables when running parallel to framing members. Here is a image off the internet as an example only there are some minor issues but you get the idea. Notice the large nm cable is just stabled to the face of the joists which is allowed if the cable meets specifications in the NEC.
 
#8 ·
wowjason said:
Ok so first time poster here. First let me say I realize there are some things I should not do myself. However the majority of what I want and need to do I can handle. I just want help doing it as safely as possible and make sure it's to code. Next let me state that I checked with my city and they go by 2008 NEC code.

This is all in a house I just bought. So my questions are:

1) What are the issues with wiring in my basement being ran together in the corner underneath the joists like this?

2) What's the best way to go about cleaning it up?

3) From other posts I think I can rerun wires like this below directly through the joist across the air flow. It's just a return.

4) this is the one that I'm fuzzy on. This is a regular duct and a few are touching it and some are not. Is this against code and if so, how should I rerun it?

5) Finally this is similar to the first one but runs along the main brave through the middle of the basement ceiling.

Forgot to add these pics. The first one is another pic for question 1 and the second pic is the one I forgot to include for question 5.







 
#15 ·
1) What are the issues with wiring in my basement ...?
The issues are almost all "cosmetic"... not functional.
I think one might be an actual code error... depending.

2) What's the best way to go about cleaning it up?
To what end?

If/when you do some remodeling work down there
then you can go back and catch all this stuff.

Until then? leave sleeping dogs lie.
Surely you can find some work to do around the house
that actually needs doing. Right?
 
#16 ·
Well it just kind of snow balled. : - ) The wife's family bought me a compressor for Christmas that needs a dedicated 220 line. So I got to looking at my main and there are no spots open. Then I got to looking at how many breakers were in the box and it just didn't make sense for the amount of outlets, lights, etc. It's a '77 house and I know it's had some major remodeling done a few times within the pas 10 years. I then assumed that rather then run some of the smaller stuff off of existing lines whoever did the remodel just ran new lines.

So I thought I should be able to re-run/combine some of the circuits but Knew I should figure out what's on everything. I bought one of those $40 circuit finders at Harbor Freight and went to town. I now have almost every circuit/outlet/light/etc. mapped out (well with the exception of one mystery circuit and one mystery light switch). I found several circuits with only 1, 2 or 3 outlets on them and a couple mor that don't go to anything anymore.

Long story short since I have to do this anyway, I'm going to clean up all of the wiring/code issues, free up a spot for a double 60 amp breaker and just run a supanel to my garage for the compressor and other misc. wood working items I have.

Any thoughts? : - )
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top