Rant - I'm trying to spend money, and getting little/no help.......:)

[W2R]

I would not assume that an electrical engineer would be qualified to do house wiring. Thought your guy may be.

While a EE will (should!) undertand all the concepts, 90% of wiring is mechanical. Some (not all) EEs are awful when it comes to mechanical stuff.

This is SO true. An EE degree is not advanced electrician's training. I must admit that I was drooling at FD's plans to install

recessed can lights (12), outlets, a few 3-way switches, some dimmers, and a couple extra outlets for a microwave and a fridge

Sounds like some wonderful improvements. I have an EE degree and (coincidently) could do the switches and dimmers, but I would hire an electrician rather than attempt to do much more than that myself.

 

[FinanceDude]

I would not assume that an electrical engineer would be qualified to do house wiring. Thought your guy may be.

While a EE will (should!) undertand all the concepts, 90% of wiring is mechanical. Some (not all) EEs are awful when it comes to mechanical stuff. I'm pretty good with mechanical stuff, but I had to do some research to understand just what some of those codes were about. You could violate tons of 'em, and the electrons would flow just fine and obey all the laws of physics, and even be perfectly safe. But.... you might make it really hard for the next guy coming along to know what you did, if he had to change something, or you might make a minor repair big hassle (bury a junction box behind a wall, for example).

Some of the codes are designed to protect you if X *and* Y both fail, and someone does some certain action, all at the same time. Even though any two of those may never create a problem. So those are actually kind of hard to visualize. But the codes have evolved over time, and that is one of the reasons that there are as few electrical injuries as there are, especially when you consider how may times a day people are coming into contact with it.

-ERD50

I should probably submit that my friend has wired 7 basements before mine, including his own.

I have done simple wiring before, know how to use a voltmeter, etc......

220 AMP circuits? I LEAVE THOSE BADBOYS ALONE!!!

 

[FinanceDude]

They must have been marveling at the way you were handling the task. Perhaps they were taking notes....

Come to think of it, they were all women..........

 

[FinanceDude]

Pics will be forthcoming on the process of the work......

 

[bbbamI]

Come to think of it, they were all women..........

Well now...maybe I should blow the dust off my resume and see if I can get an interview there. The job doesn't sound bad to me...no work and interesting scenery.

 

[Westernskies]

I should probably submit that my friend has wired 7 basements before mine, including his own.

I have done simple wiring before, know how to use a voltmeter, etc......

220 AMP circuits? I LEAVE THOSE BADBOYS ALONE!!!

220 AMPS? Whoa!

watts/volts=amps...

 

[REWahoo]

Yep. Probably a very good idea FD leaves those "badboys" alone...

 

[FinanceDude]

220 AMPS? Whoa!

watts/volts=amps...

I think I meant volts........

However, I grew up with one of those huge tower transmission lines across the street. After a rain they would crackle like a 500 ton box of Kellogg's Snap Crackle Pop........

The electrician told me the average dehumidifier draws almost 10 amps....that's a lot of juice......

 

[Westernskies]

The electrician told me the average dehumidifier draws almost 10 amps....that's a lot of juice......

You're making juice with your dehumidifier? That's taking LBYM a bit far don't you think?...

 

[FinanceDude]

You're making juice with your dehumidifier? That's taking LBYM a bit far don't you think?...

Hey, it's my way of going green...........

 

[joesxm3]

I went into local furniture store .Granted I had just come from the gym so I had my gym clothes on but no one would help me . I was seriously interested in some furniture . I even went to where the owner was sitting and she still ignored me . They now have huge sale signs in their window maybe I'll stop in again and see what happens . Usually I would not return to a store that would ignore me but they have some really unique items.

Some five years ago when I was replacing my 10 year old Honda Prelude I went to the Mercedes dealer to see what they had. I went with the clothes I had on at work which were pretty low scale.

I waited about 10 minutes and could not be approached by a sales person so I left.

This was before I was careful managing my money so the joke was on them - I had enough in my checking account at the moment to buy two of anything they had on their lot.

Fortunately I kept to my LBYM mentality and did "splurge" on an Acura TSX. I am now on my sixth year with it and looking forward to driving it for another five or six at least. I do have a little remorse when I ride in my co-worker's Honda Civic. If I were doing it now I would give some serious thought to the Civic and $15k in my pocket.

 

[limpid lizard]

I worked at one of the big box stores for a little while last fall. The quality of the help is based on a couple of in store factors and control from afar.

The manager is required to implement whatever order comes down from on high. In my experience, when a lay off is pending, the people laid off are selected by time with the store by on high decree. The local manager has little to no discretion in selecting which employee to lay off.

Internally, the department managers select which employees works when. If the department is doing badly in sales due to 9 out of 10 employees being ignorant or lazy, the department manager may decide to work the good employee to death or until said employee quits. An incompetent manager sees this as a solution to doing his or her own job.

Another in store problem is that employees are valued by the amount of customer's that complement them online. Let's just say that this is an easily rigged system. LL