Do electric wires make noise?

Question

There is a regular noise coming from inside the wall (near the baseboard) of our 100 year old house. It is a faint, single "tick" about once every 30 to 45 seconds. It is barely noticeable except at night when the house is quiet. There is an electrical outlet on that wall, but almost nothing plgged into it. We also have hot water heat, but as far as I know there are no pipes running there. Any ideas?

It is hot water baseboard, but it is far from the register. Plus it is a very regular frequency. The house has had most of the wiring upgraded (but who know what's behind the walls.) I'll shut off the circuit to that outlet and see if the tick goes away.

Answer 1

Wires do not make noise! You may want to have an electrician look into it it may be wires arching across each other.

Answer 2

You said that you had hot water heat; does that mean hot water baseboard? If so, does the ticking sound come when the furnace kicks on to heat your house? I grew up with hot water baseboard heat (heating registers on one or more walls near the floor, usually running almost the entire length of the wall). Every time the furnace started and the hot water began to flow through the pipes in the registers, there was a ticking sound; that's normal as the cold pipe is getting a 'shot' of hot water.

If you don't have this kind of heat and are worried about it being electrical, hire an electrician to check it out for you. And as another post said, in an older house, this ticking noise could be just about anything

Answer 3

sometimes a house can tick because of thermal expansion- a loose board, pipe, conduit expands and contracts to to changes in temperature- creating a ticking noise as it slowly changes shape.
CPVC pipes are notorious for doing this in new homes, in older homes it can be anything. The only real solution would be to open the wall and secure whatever it is that is moving around making the noise.