I need info on problems with aluminum wire in residential housing.?

Answer 1

Receptacles and switches must be marked CU/AL. Aluminum tends to "cold flow" under pressure and must be periodically retightened (with the power off!) . I use a compound called "NO-LOX", available at an electrical supply store on the wire ends before connecting them. If at all feasible, replacing with copper would be the ideal solution

Answer 2

they used aluminum before they used copper, they can be used together but must have a special "goo" (antioxidant) from electrical dealer), for cu/al, (copper/aluminum) connections. aluminum softens over the years and ALL connections should be checked and tightened, loose connections can cause heat and fire. Aluminum is safe to use but you must be carefull because it breaks easily. when you use aluminum you must use 1 size bigger than the copper, copper size, 14 gauge=12 gauge aluminum, you must check from the breaker or fuse box to all the lites and plugs and switches, appliance circiuts and heater circiuts are vital, good luck and remember to turn the power off before ANY work is done...

Answer 3

aluminum wiring tends to loosen as it flattens out over time.creates a fire hazard.illegal in most states except for the entrance

Answer 4

you can only use AL. as an entrance wire in residentiAL if you have al. going to any outlets or lights it must be replaced.

Answer 5

The wiring will overheat and cause fires. Check your outlets for heating.

Answer 6

You have a problem, but since I have experience in electrical and I have aluminum wiring in my house, I can help you out.

This is going to be a long, arduous, process, but it has to be done. Aluminum was used for a while in this area in the early 70s when the price of Cu wire went out of sight.

There are two houses in my subdivision with it - one owned by me and the other (original owner) was the lead county electrical inspector.

First thing to do is to look and see if the leads from the meter to your circuit breaker, or fuse box, has a compound on it, not just raw wires going into it. If you have just plain wiring, you are going to need an electrician who has authority to remove your meter, kill all the power in your house and repair that. The compound can be greyish, almost clear, but will look like a caulk or a grease.

You will find that almost no one knows a damned thing about aluminum wiring and most of it was installed with problems.

After you make that inspection in your circuit breaker box, look on the sides or the breakers (it will be there somewhere, even on the part you can immediately see. What you are looking for is an indicator that says either CuAl, or CoAl. Those breakers are approved for both copper and Aluminum. If you have any that say Cu or Cu only, get them out of there fast. If they don't have Al on them somewhere that indicates that you can use it, change it.

You may have to search for breakers approved for AL, but many are. Do not go to Lowes or Home Depot, I have never met anyone in the electrical department in those stores that knows anything about your problem.

Go then to a major Electrical Supply house armed with the model and brand of the breaker box that you have. Tell him you have Aluminum wires and need an approved breaker in the amp rating that you need. Rewiring breakers is not difficult and it can be done with the power on. But if you have a main power switch that disables the whole box, you might want to kill that. You have to remove the whole cover to the box (even to inspect the breakers). There should be three wires to every circuit unless your house is much older. these are the US type - if you are European, the colors might be different). One insulated wire will be white, one black, and one bare. You will have a rack at the side that will have some of the bare wires screwed into it. You will also see another rack of holes that has the white The two wires that are in those holes are both grounds, so your circuit is actually double grounded. (Just Get the colors right and in the right places. Take a screw driver that can be held without hitting either of the two other wires, and tighten those wires in the grounding circuit as tight you are can get it. Pull one breaker out at a time, you can do it, (that is when you inspect the breakers for Cu only or CuAl), and after you have it out, check the inserted wire, black. there should be something in there that would look like a paste or a grey greasy substance. That is an antioxidant and if it is not there, remove the wire, put some in (one brand is NOALOX, but there are several brands which might look different) into the place where the wire is inserted into the breaker, reinsert the wire, and tighten as hard as you can get it by hand.

Follow that procedure for all breakers.

You have two other problems now.

1. You have to check all switches and wall plugs. This is done with the Power off, so switch the breaker off that controls that area. So that you can see if the power is off there, I always connect a light into the circuit and when it goes off, I know the power is off. Remove the switches and wall plugs and inspect them. See if they have the antioxidant on them and if not, unscrew the screw and squeeze some antioxidant in there. Then tighten down the screw as tight as you can get it. I do not advise tightening them down with a power screwdriver because all of those things are made of cheap plastic. (Now when you have the switch or wall plug out, inspect it for evidence that it will take Al or Copper - if it does not say AL, then you will have to replace that device. Buying replacement devices, switches and plugs, can be a pain in the tail - you will probably have to order them and the best thing to do is to count your switches and count your wall plugs, and order 10 more than you could ever use. I say that because those things will fail and then when you need to replace one in a hurry, you don't have to go anywhere to get one because no one will have them - I have 30 of each in my home in a box.) You have to do that with all screws on that switch or wall plug - put in antioxidant. There are many circuits in your house and where they go can be a mystery, so if you really want to know if the power is on, get one of the little circuit testers that tell you if the polarity of the switch is OK, plug that in. If all the lights come on, it is hot, if they are all OFF, it is OK, but if it tells you that the wall plug is wired wrong correct that as you are doing this process.

always check polarity. One side of the switch and the wall plug is copper in color, the other side is Alum. colored. check and see how one that has no polarity problems is wired and continue that system.

You will have to do that for all switches and wall plugs in your house. In my house there are 20 circuits, so that means I have to find each and every circuit, but off the appropriate one, and work that circuit. Do not forget the dedicated wall plugs and switches, like those for the washer and dryer, refrigerator, stove and oven (and those may well be copper), AC, any heating circuits and any others that you can think of. The dryer may have 220, which will mean that it has a double breaker, and if that one is not switched off, you can get dead depending on the amount of amps on the circuit. Check any outside plugs or switches.

Same process - check out polarity, loosen the screws (you don't have to take the wires out, but that is probably better - but aluminum is brittle and can break). add antioxidant, retighten as hard as you can with your hands, close up the wall plug and go to the next. You are going to be on your hands and knees for a long time.

If you have dimmers, say in the dining room, or if you have two or three way switches, you may find out as I did, that they did not use AL rated devices and you will have to replace them. I don't recommend dimmers on any circuit. Two or three way switches just means that there are two or three wall switches that will turn the lights off in that room. Like in a dining room or in a long hall.

Of course you don't have to be on your hands and knees to do the light switches, just remove them (when they are turned off at the breaker), check for antioxidant the same way, put some in, screw the screw down hard, and proceed to the next. In a two or three way circuit, the colors might not seem right, but if they work, just leave them alone. That is becuse of what you have to do to wire one of the circuits.

2. Now get a NON metal ladder and that can mean wood or fiberglass, and open up all of the ceiling fixtures one at a time - with teh circuit breakers off, of course, and you will see smaller wires connected to the normal AL circuit wires with the connections held firm by either what is called wire nuts, or with a collar something like a .22 bullet in width pinched on with a special pair of pliers. Those should have the antioxidant on them also. So remove the wire nut, or the copper ring, put antioxidant in there, and use wire nuts to hold them together. and then wrap them with black electrical tape, unless you are on hallucinagenics, and then you might want to use red and black tapes, each on a different side. Spice up your life.

After you have done that to all of the ceiling fixtures, you should be pretty well through.

Tools:

One phillips and one straight screw driver big enough to get into the slots of switches or wall plugs.

one pair of needle nose pliers in case you have to take a wire off and another pair of electrician's pliers in case you have to wrap two wires together.

A roll, or three or four if you want to be colorful, of electrician's tape. I recommend 3M

A pair of wire cutters in case you might need them.

A pocket knife or a wire stripper in case you break off some of teh aluminum and have to strip some insulation off to be a good connection.

A non conductive ladder

A lot of patience.

A cool head

A questioning mind in case youhave to call the electrical supply to ask a question.

Enough antioxidant to do the job, I get mine is a size similar to a large size of Elmer's white wood glue.

it is not bad to have someone in the house to call the medics if the ladder collapses or if you get a serious shock.

I fyou open a circuit that you know to be dead, but you receive a light shock, there is a problem, perhaps two circuits in the same box, and an electrician should be called.

If y ou have any questions, email me.

If you have new appliance in your house that were installed by someone who might not have known what they were doing, you should check the wiring on those, like a dish washer. 200% of electricians today do not know enough about aluminum wiring to know what to do and appliance installers sent by Best Buys or something, know less. (my dishwasher was not installed right and the wires burned through. When I called a dishwasher man to "repair" it, he found they were burned through and went to connect them again. He had no concept of antioxidant, so I showed him how to do it, actually making the repair myself and still had to pay the sob $75 for showing up to take a lesson.

Extending circuit, adding new wall boxes - you are not going to be able to buy aluminum wire in the right sizes to do that today, you are going to have to extend by combining with copper. In doing that, where you have to connect copper to aluminum, use a "split bolt" obtainable from the Electrical Supply, use the antioxidant, and then you need a special rubber tape to wrap the whole thing off - you are going to have a big knot to deal with.

Why all of this crap has to be done? Aluminum is a fine conductor. All of your wires to the house from the pole or from the transformer are AL. All of the wires that run from pole to pole down the street are AL. What aluminum does not like is pressure and when you connect something into an AL wired plug, you get pressure on the AL. When AL is under substantial pressure, like with a toaster or an electrical heater, it starts wiggling, actually moving, and it will literally unscrew the screws that hold it in position in the plug that you are using. I have had them that had to be turned five complete turns to tighten them back up. If they get loose, or too loose, you will get a spark, sparks cause fire, blow circuits, etc.

Now that you have all of this done, you check all your connections in a year to a year and a half, being careful to tighten all screws, or at least check how tight they are.

There are things that you can look for. If you see a new static on your television when you watch it, feel the switch plates on that circuit - if they are warm, you have a problem. That is how I figured that my box had problems. If lights in use tend to blink too much, check that.

The best piece of test equipment you can have is a $5 AM transister radio that uses batteries. AM will pick up any static there is and if you suspect a circuit problem, turn the radio on to a good station, walk around the house placing the radio real close to the switch or wall plug, and if you get a lot of static on the radio, there is a strong chance there is your problem. The power company will tell you that you need a $100,000 piece of equipment - but most of those have had so much indoctrination that they hardly know right from wrong any more. An AM radio will give you static, however, if it is close to a florescent fixture.

hope this helps.