CheckItOut

That is my understanding. Thanks.

House I looked at today had a mix of copper and poly plumbing and a few pieces of PEX at the newly installed water heater. Cold line did have a bond wire on it within about a foot of water heater. Due to PEX, the bond is not carried through WH and remainder of copper. Since most plumbing is hidden, I don't know if they have copper, poly back to copper. What I am getting at is trying to figure out what the point would be in running a bond to the hot line at WH to re-bong lines as they were at one time. With all the poly, does not seem like it will do much good other to equalize potential (with electrical system) for the little bit of copper I can see. Write it up or keep moving?

Inspected a house built in 2003 with a second floor that was just finished this month. Heat pump was manufactured in 1989. Buyer was not real thrilled to lean this. CO just obtained. Efficiency is very low compared with minimums of today. According to the State, federal energy standards prohibit this (unless hoops are jumped through), but since that is not mentioned in the code book, code official can't do anything about it.

Thanks guys.

This is a subpanel in a 1966 house. Neutrals are on buss bars. All of the available bars are tied together we can't just add grounds to bars the neutrals are on. Grounds are connected at a variety of places including under one of four screws holding the buss/breaker assembly to the panel box. Another example is a bunch of wires twisted together that are too short to reach a connection point so another wire is twisted to them and placed under a screw. Is the proper ground wire attachment point the lugs on either side of the box? Just stuff a bunch of wires under the lug and snug? Click to Enlarge 58.34 KB

ie a separate ground wire vs. two hots and a neutral. House was built in 1953 but has breakers now and I'd guess the panel boxes were replaced in the 70's. Trying to figure out what year the four wire was required vs. three.

Nothing come out of the other side so I'd say no. Maybe a damper?

House built in 1953 and this is right off the supply line coming through foundation wall. Kind of rounded at the bottom with a bolt/nut on the bottom. Click to Enlarge 45.43 KB

That is correct, it is not connected to anything.

House is ten years old. Click to Enlarge 40.74 KB

Title says this was moved to a new thread. Where is the new thread?

Made of standard 8 x 8 x 16 CMUs. I have never seen a foundation wall as smooth as drywall. If not smooth and even, the large rigid foam board (some are full 4 x 8 sheets) will not fit flush.

In the process of sealing my crawl space and ran the vapor barrier up to about 3" from top of foundation wall. Now I am installing Dow Thermax 1.5" R-10 on the walls. Since the foundation walls are not perfectly smooth/even, the insulation board will not make full contact with the walls. If not making contact, it is not doing much good. Most installations I see have spray foam sealing gap between the board and foundation wall around the perimeter of the boards. So the space between the board and wall is still present but air flow has been cut off. My concern with this is a possible condensation issue due to the cold foundation wall (in winter anyway) and warmer back of insulation board. What do you think the chances of condensation formation are here?

That hit me just before I read your comment. I don't know if they extend down or not. I can't see them - plastic in the way. If they did extend all the way down, we'd have a problem which is that brought up the issue. So they must not extend down.

Do you have a picture of the wiring diagram by chance? No, but you can see four wires at the main lugs.

Hi Mark, A back fed panel is simply a panel that has the service/ feeder wires run to a breaker, and the breaker is what supplies power to the panel. But then what are the other wires doing attached to the main lugs? Feeds from the main panel, right? Then those wires are feeding the sub not the breaker.

This is a nice FPE Stab Lok sub panel. You can see wires on the main lugs that go directly to a two pole breaker. No other wires are involved. So, what is the purpose/intent? And why has this not exploded? Voltage across the breaker terminals is 230. Click to Enlarge 55.5 KB

I don't think there is an air space. So, in that case you would reference the MVMA document and it should have weep screeds at the base of the wall, above windows and doors, not go into the ground, caulk between stone and trim (like brick moldings, etc).

House was built in 2008 and has real stone veneer on part of the home. There are no readily-visible drainiage provisions as you would find with brick. Using the 2000 IRC R703.7, it states that "All stone and masonry veneer shall be installed in accordance with this chapter, Table R703.4 and Figure R703.7..." Looking at figure R703.7, it clearly shows weepholes. And, R703.7.6 (located in "this chapter") states necessity of weepholes. Local code enforcement states weeps are necessary on stone veneer. I got mixed answers from other contractors and home inspectors. Now, this house is a new construction foreclosure. Bank took it over and a contractor was assigned to make repairs from my report. Contractor stated that the stone manufacturer said specific weeps are not necessary when gaps are intentionally left in the mortar between stones as gaps serve as weeps. That makes sense to some degree and mortar is not real tight on this home; gaps present in random places. However, weeps are supposed to be placed immediately above the flashing. So, I would think I would see a horizontal line in the stone where the bottom of stone, and mortar gaps, would serve as weeps (make sense?) I don't see any planned break or purposeful patten to the stone where the flashing would be. What do you think? Click to Enlarge 65.22 KB

That is what I initially thought but it did not move and I could not move it by hand.

I think mine will do that, Panasonic DMC-Z53, but I am real careful with it whereas the voice recorder gets crawl space dirt wedged in every crack - speaker is nearly full of it now.

I have been using Olympus VN-960PCs for several years with good results but you can't buy them new anymore. Anyone have recommendations of a durable and cost effective unit?

New construction. There are plastic devices in the tracks of a few windows in this home. No pattern related to window size as most were the same. Some of the windows that did not have this gadget were difficult to operate. Coincidence? Was this installed to try and open the jambs to make operation easier? With repeated use, I think it may kill the sash tilt/release tabs b/c they slam open when contacting this gadget each time window is operated. Click to Enlarge 30.17 KB

Take a look at the pic. Only thing I can think is that the service cables run out of the house wall and into the meter box with no conduit and a thing (person, tree, mower) caught and pulled on them.

That is interesting. Thanks for your comment.