Old-Time Florida Electrician used Rigid Conduit with all-red #12 TW Conductors.

[ocalavoltage]

I was recalling one of Mike's old videos where he mentioned a fella who used red TW conductors only. According to the video, the guy would identify his conductors with little marks by using his Kleins.

It rang familiar because I had seen such a panel in Ocala in a block building that was once a gas station, it appeared to have been built in the `40s or `50s. Every conductor in the panel was Red TW!

This person may have traveled around a multi-state area to wire these commercial buildings, so I wondered if anyone else has ever run across this strange all-red wiring?


Rich

 

[SceneryDriver]

Not all-red wiring, but several years ago, I ended up rewiring an entire house that was similar. We'd been originally contracted to add circuits for a kitchen remodel; we ended up having to rewire the entire 2-bedroom ranch from service mast to sump pump outlet in the crawlspace.

When the inspector came to look at the kitchen rough-in, he basically told the homeowners they had to rewire the house, or he wouldn't pass the kitchen - it was that bad. He actually threatened to red-tag the whole house if it wasn't worked on immediately.

Some of the greatest hits:
Service mast held up by little more than flashing and copious amounts of roof tar. The roof and framing around the mast penetration had rotted from water infiltration.

All-green #14 conductors and a 30A breaker on a receptacle circuit was the least of our problems.

In one location, I had three wires enter a conduit, and four, differently colored wires exit out the other end. The friction tape splices in the pipe were spectacular. At least they were staggered?!?!

Romex with no box clamps and the ground wire cut off, running everywhere in the attic.

Open and massively overstuffed j-boxes everywhere.

And my favorite: direct-buried TW conductors serving the detached garage. And of course no ground wire.



The entire house was like that, and when the inspector told the homeowner how dangerous it was, he replied. "Well it works, don't it?"

We spent almost three weeks there, instead of the originally planned three days. Roy, the husband, was grumbly about his "work" being red-tagged. I think his wife was relieved that the house was finally safely wired. She promised us that she would keep him from doing any more electrical "repairs" in the future.

To this day, my coworker and I refer to jobs that balloon in scope and time as "getting Roy-ed."



SceneryDriver

 

[Tony S]

All blacks are the ones I ran in to frequently (not the rugby team). In the bottom of the panel would be a collection of dried out coloured tape markers.

They were installed back in the days of cotton covered rubber insulation (VIR). The tape was also cotton so it dried out and fell off.

 

[K8MHZ]

All black wires in a steel mill I worked in for a brief time. Even down to #12s.

The reason I was given was no matter what color they came off the roll, they would all be black within a few months and if you have to trust wire colors to do your job, an old steel mill probably wasn't the best place in the world to be working.

 

[Tony S]

All black wires in a steel mill I worked in for a brief time. Even down to #12s.

The reason I was given was no matter what color they came off the roll, they would all be black within a few months and if you have to trust wire colors to do your job, an old steel mill probably wasn't the best place in the world to be working.

Guess where I was working?

 

[K8MHZ]

Guess where I was working?

Well, I don't think it was in BOF. They didn't use tape, either. Probably because the guys that worked there knew the tape wouldn't last, either, so why bother?

That was a place to fall in love with a solenoid tester.

 

[ptonsparky]

I was taught the wire marking method via Kliens to identify the switch legs during Romex rough in. Everyone in the shop knew the method so it worked well.

 

[GrayHair]

Old multi-zone (20+?) fire panel in a church had all red conductors, except for the 120V power. Later I had to relocate the remote annunciator and that was fun!

 

[zbang]

Well, I don't think it was in BOF.

Or the blast furnace or coke ovens, they're nasty too.

 

[K8MHZ]

Or the blast furnace or coke ovens, they're nasty too.

BOF = Blast Oxygen Furnace.

 

[kwired]

Other then the NEC requirement to use white or gray for grounded conductors, and green for equipment grounding conductors, nothing prohibits using all same color. If you want further identification you can get pretty creative on how to do it. Further identification is required when more then one voltage system is present - but only to the extent of identifying the separate voltage systems and phases of those systems.

You can have a conduit filled with 100 control leads, most people will prefer an alphanumeric type of identification system and will only identify such conductors at the termination points. If mass producing some equipment they may use conductors with the identification incorporated into the markings on the conductor, but for a one time install it is usually going to be field applied markings.

Of course today you are more likely to find those 100 control leads to be replaced with one fiber optic cable.