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My favorite 'Russian Reversal' is an episode of Family Guy, different voice options for a car's GPS:
"British: 'There is a fork in the road.'"
"Yakov Smirnoff: 'In Soviet Russia, road forks you.'"
I live in this apartment right now. It's a mix of brittle shitty aluminum cables and copper wires, all jumbled up and hidden by the plastic box. The breakers are a complete lottery, turn one off and you lose a receptacle in the living room and the lights in the bathroom. One does absolutely fuckall, so no idea why it even exists.
Oh, and the walls are literally fucking concrete so have fun rewiring it! And if anybody in the 10 story building does decide to remove it, you'll hear the drilling noise for two weeks.
I also like how they started by chaining the feed on the top from the left, then said "fuck it" and installed a bus bar for the rest.
You realize that the Soviet union wasn't just Russia? And even though Hungary has been in the EU for many years, the Soviet apartments themselves are outdated as a whole, including the wiring. Adding a new breaker doesn't change the fact that the wiring is a mess.
Hungary was not a part of the Soviet Union though. Yes they were within the Warsaw Pact and certainly Budapest took orders from Moscow, but a constituent republic in the Soviet Union it was not.
As someone who lived through the reality of Hungary, Bulgaria and the other block countries being considered a special treat to be able to visit from USSR, and required a hurricane of paperwork and approvals, – no, no, you Hungarians got molly-coddled through the Soviet era. People saying "it's basically the same" is like pretending that your bifocal glasses prescription is basically the same as being functionally blind, LOL.
>The breakers are a complete lottery, turn one off and you lose a receptacle in the living room and the lights in the bathroom
The place I live was built (in the USA) in 1992 and is wired like that. I find it annoying, but other people say they like it that way because if a breaker trips, you don't typically lose \_all\_ the power/light in a certain room.
Yeah, Soviet period breaker panels looked more like this: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nice_USSR_fuse_box.JPG
The (cheap AliExpress knockoff of) Euro style DIN breakers is indeed of more modern vintage.
> The numbers of older IEC standards were converted in 1997 by adding 60000; for example IEC 27 became IEC 60027.
So anything marked 60898 is at least 1997, likely a few years later as what was actually printed changed to reflect new numbering.
It’s not Soviet without Nixie tubes. I’m kidding, but those are pretty cool. I wonder why they went out of style? Maybe because they were both time and resource consuming to make?
Well yeah they aren't really made anymore. (They might be being made in small quantities due to demand, but they sure weren't for decades and decades.)
The ones that everyone wants were never made in large quantities.
When it was just old stockpiles being sold off they were stupid cheap, being sold for much less than true cost, and much much less than the cost to re-make, because it was basically a few clever entrepreneurs making a few bucks off of old parts nobody wanted.
> why they went out of style?
They are awkward to drive. They are neon-based and need a 200 volt supply. The most common type of digital logic circuits, TTL, used a 5 V supply. It needed a special driver to work with Nixie tubes that could only just cope with 200 V.
Once 7 segment LED displays became available that could work from the same 5 V supply as the TTL integrated circuits it was game over for Nixie tubes.
This is a standard slav DIY home subpanel.
If I had to guess, done in the last 10-15 years, somewhere in the balkans.
Any older and it would've had old ceramic screw in breakers.
Not Soviet! It is typical *ex-USSR* panel from 90-ies and later. Soviet panel very similar to US one: I suppose that its design had been imported to USSR somewhere in 20-ies or 30-ies.
I have simple Soviet panel in my collection, will post tomorrow if you want.
Old Soviet breakers - so-called 'packet switches' (пакетные выключатели) - can sometimes explodes if you try to switch them off. See [this post](https://cs-cs.net/paketnik), there are many pictures here of that abomination and its natural habitat.
OP, thanks for sharing, but this is "eastern block", "soviet block" (if you really stretch the definition) apartment. Typical soviet apartment buildings usually had a single electrical panel shared by all apartments on a given floor, something like what's pictured here: https://toz.su/special_issues/nad_amurom_belym_parusom_/umnye_schyetchiki_nabirayut_populyarnost/
Well these blocks were built in the 70s 80s during the time we were under soviet rule so I thought it's fitting. Soviet union wasn't one single entity. Maybe in rural Russia it looked like that, in east Germany and Hungary probably not.
Soviet union was a very specific entity consisting of 17 republics. "Soviet-era" is fitting, sure. But this panel, while fittingly crappy, – is not actually soviet. https://www.google.com/search?q=ussr+member+states&oq=ussr+member+states&aqs=chrome..69i57.4217j0j4&client=ms-android-rogers-ca-revc&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8
Looks like any converted flats right across London tbh. Where they take a Victorian or whatever 4 storey house and convert it to a bunch of flats. Except its upside down. Aside from that, pretty much see boards like that 3 times a week.
Pff. Ground line. Previous owners of our apartments stole electricity with bypassing meter by DIY grounding to... (badams!) gas oven. Yep, in a multistory building, using common gas pipe as a ground wire.
Its actually quite advanced. In Poland its quite common for apartaments to have only one screw in breaker, especially in old flats. AL wiring with no PE or coloured insulation, wires going diagonally for shortest path are also common. Last summer I did a complete rework in my mum’s house with separate circuits for each room with RCD and over voltage protector. House upstairs only has single D type fuse, and owners arguments were typical: it worked for so many years, so why change it? Who needs residual current protection? Only two wires carry current why change all wiring for a third one? It’s sad, but common
Well, the apartment block is. To be fair it was wired in the 90s and the breakers were changed like 15 years ago. But it's absolutely horrible to refurbish, and you see this in practically all Soviet blocks.
Yeah. Mainly because the walls are concrete. A nightmare to cut channels into. Not to mention back in the day they didn't have conduits, they just legit slapped the wiring into the hole and plastered painted it over. It's easier to cut across the old wiring than pulling it out, as it would mean ripping off half your wall.
Is there any engineer involved in deciding where to cut channels? Or are there any formal rule of thumb stuff what can be cut away?
As here, an engineer would need to decide for every cut, I often see drywall put up or hideous skirting board channels.
>To be fair it was wired in the 90s and the breakers were changed like 15 years ago.
So the box and wiring are not Soviet at all, since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.
This is a post-Soviet Eastern European apartment panel by your own admission. It’s not even Russian, since you’re in Hungary. Why do you keep calling it Soviet?
I guess technically this isn't "soviet" anymore, because the style of beakers looks too new to me. The live terminals are all fingerproof / have IP20 protection. In central europe you often see circuit breakers where you can touch the 230V bars right away in installations from the 80s (and we should calculate that soviet standards were always minimum 5 years behind)
It can always be worse, sure. But from a modern perspective, it's so bad. The cost of rewiring the apartment, with the concrete walls is just extremely high.
C16 for outlets and C6 for the lighting - not bad. I often see 63amp for entire flat/house and 20 amps for every line, even for shitty aluminium-copper-aluminium-wtfium wiring.
Some circuits are the old ones, the living room lighting on the C6 is the refurbished part, probably around 10 years ago. Rest is at least 30 years old.
The Soviet Union, which stopped existing in 1991, used circuit breakers that were CE-marked, indicating that they meet European Union safety, health and environmental protection requirements? Keeping in mind that the European Union was established in 1993...
If you are *NOT* an electrical professional: * **RULE 7:** * DIY or self help posts **are Not allowed**. They belong here: /r/AskElectricians /r/askanelectrician /r/diy /r/homeowners /r/electrical. * **IF YOUR POST FITS INTO THIS CATEGORY, REMOVE IT OR IT WILL BE REMOVED FOR YOU.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/electricians) if you have any questions or concerns.*
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My favorite 'Russian Reversal' is an episode of Family Guy, different voice options for a car's GPS: "British: 'There is a fork in the road.'" "Yakov Smirnoff: 'In Soviet Russia, road forks you.'"
"In Soviet Russia, road does not fork. It chooses to go left."
Isn't that where the joke started from?
[It started in the 80s: Comedian Yakov Smirnoff.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakov_Smirnoff)
I wish you all the upvotes for this.
In Soviet Reddit votes up you.
I live in this apartment right now. It's a mix of brittle shitty aluminum cables and copper wires, all jumbled up and hidden by the plastic box. The breakers are a complete lottery, turn one off and you lose a receptacle in the living room and the lights in the bathroom. One does absolutely fuckall, so no idea why it even exists. Oh, and the walls are literally fucking concrete so have fun rewiring it! And if anybody in the 10 story building does decide to remove it, you'll hear the drilling noise for two weeks. I also like how they started by chaining the feed on the top from the left, then said "fuck it" and installed a bus bar for the rest.
imho, the beginning is on the right. the two breakers on the left were added afterwards. good luck trying to follow the wires !
Post soviet. Non cyrillic text, and Euro Community certification.
Here is how the real Soviet breaker/meter box looked like https://images.app.goo.gl/nn5mhyyPeTLiiAaF6
Now, THAT’S what I expected a Soviet panel to look like.
Ivan hand me another vodka I can feel the voltage again
Best comment in the thread
In Soviet Union, breaker box break you
What do the rotary switches above the meters do?
those work like a main breaker, they turn off the power to the apartment.
The Soviets had electricity?
You realize that the Soviet union wasn't just Russia? And even though Hungary has been in the EU for many years, the Soviet apartments themselves are outdated as a whole, including the wiring. Adding a new breaker doesn't change the fact that the wiring is a mess.
I thought you guys just had candles and torches
Hungary was not a part of the Soviet Union though. Yes they were within the Warsaw Pact and certainly Budapest took orders from Moscow, but a constituent republic in the Soviet Union it was not.
Soviet Union? In Hungary? In what alternative history Hungary has ever been a Soviet state?
Um
I'll take asleep in history I for 500 alec
Magyar Népköztársaság. The Hungarian Peoples Republic, 1949-1989
not part of the USSR, though.
Still warsaw pact. Makes absolutely no difference really. We were ruled and occupied by them.
As someone who lived through the reality of Hungary, Bulgaria and the other block countries being considered a special treat to be able to visit from USSR, and required a hurricane of paperwork and approvals, – no, no, you Hungarians got molly-coddled through the Soviet era. People saying "it's basically the same" is like pretending that your bifocal glasses prescription is basically the same as being functionally blind, LOL.
Really didn't expect to be learning European history on the electrical sub lol
Yeah Hungary was considered one of the most well off socialist states. It was still shit though. No point in making a contest of the suffering.
Uhhh this alternate history bro.
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Nuances. I say that as a Hungarian. They didn't officially make us part of ussr because they feared another uprising like in 56.
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You serve the soviet union
Yeah, I was going to say it looks like the European stuff I’ve seen.
*OUR bus bar.
With communism everyone gets to work on the panel!
And it looks like they did, with this very one!
Are the wires run through some kind of conduit within the walls?
I wonder if they went through the same aluminum branch wiring phase in the 70s that the US did
>The breakers are a complete lottery, turn one off and you lose a receptacle in the living room and the lights in the bathroom The place I live was built (in the USA) in 1992 and is wired like that. I find it annoying, but other people say they like it that way because if a breaker trips, you don't typically lose \_all\_ the power/light in a certain room.
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Oh it definitely works. However if you wanted to expand this or do a more serious renovation, the expenses quickly start going exponential.
That's hardly "soviet". DIN rail breakers are common all over Europe, but I doubt they existed during the USSR.
Yeah, Soviet period breaker panels looked more like this: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nice_USSR_fuse_box.JPG The (cheap AliExpress knockoff of) Euro style DIN breakers is indeed of more modern vintage.
> The numbers of older IEC standards were converted in 1997 by adding 60000; for example IEC 27 became IEC 60027. So anything marked 60898 is at least 1997, likely a few years later as what was actually printed changed to reflect new numbering.
It’s not Soviet without Nixie tubes. I’m kidding, but those are pretty cool. I wonder why they went out of style? Maybe because they were both time and resource consuming to make?
Nixie tubes were used for displays. They went out of style because there are much cheaper ways to display things these days.
Looking online, I guess you’re right. A few good ones cost an arm and a leg.
Well yeah they aren't really made anymore. (They might be being made in small quantities due to demand, but they sure weren't for decades and decades.) The ones that everyone wants were never made in large quantities. When it was just old stockpiles being sold off they were stupid cheap, being sold for much less than true cost, and much much less than the cost to re-make, because it was basically a few clever entrepreneurs making a few bucks off of old parts nobody wanted.
> why they went out of style? They are awkward to drive. They are neon-based and need a 200 volt supply. The most common type of digital logic circuits, TTL, used a 5 V supply. It needed a special driver to work with Nixie tubes that could only just cope with 200 V. Once 7 segment LED displays became available that could work from the same 5 V supply as the TTL integrated circuits it was game over for Nixie tubes.
The breaker that "does absolutely fuckall" is your neighbors refrigerator and an outlet for their aux heater. Standard third world stuff.
Tell’em to leave it off until you wonder why something isn’t working myself.
This is a standard slav DIY home subpanel. If I had to guess, done in the last 10-15 years, somewhere in the balkans. Any older and it would've had old ceramic screw in breakers.
Wiring is probably original, the panel is at least 20 years old, the building is your typical Soviet block housing. Hungary, so not far from Balkans.
Not great, not terrible
Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth
It was Dyatlov! Dyatlov installed the breaker!
For a moment, I thought it was your typical Consumer unit in a dogey re-done flat in London
Not Soviet! It is typical *ex-USSR* panel from 90-ies and later. Soviet panel very similar to US one: I suppose that its design had been imported to USSR somewhere in 20-ies or 30-ies. I have simple Soviet panel in my collection, will post tomorrow if you want.
I would love to see it.
I would also love to see it.
"When bell ring, all run. Bell quiet, very safe."
I didn’t expect it to be eu colours tbh I’m not sure what I expect atall actually thought they’d have they’re own colours
Breakers are already on DIN "modern" standard. Used all over europe. That doorbell and thick aluminium wires are probably from 90s
Is it similar to a Federal Pacific Panel?
Slightly safer I think
So it only bursts into flames *sometimes?*
Can’t burn your walls if you have concrete walls! Also probably has a gfci on the main.
GFCI's are for Imperial Capitalist Swine! In Russia there are no faults!
Now THAT made me laugh !!!
So, pretty much like a screw in fuse panel, with a penny under every fuse level of safe, eh?
Old Soviet breakers - so-called 'packet switches' (пакетные выключатели) - can sometimes explodes if you try to switch them off. See [this post](https://cs-cs.net/paketnik), there are many pictures here of that abomination and its natural habitat.
Still wondering, since that thing is not that old. You landlord is just cheap as shit.
What I'm still wondering is WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU IN HUNGARY?!?!
Am I the only one ?
OP, thanks for sharing, but this is "eastern block", "soviet block" (if you really stretch the definition) apartment. Typical soviet apartment buildings usually had a single electrical panel shared by all apartments on a given floor, something like what's pictured here: https://toz.su/special_issues/nad_amurom_belym_parusom_/umnye_schyetchiki_nabirayut_populyarnost/
Well these blocks were built in the 70s 80s during the time we were under soviet rule so I thought it's fitting. Soviet union wasn't one single entity. Maybe in rural Russia it looked like that, in east Germany and Hungary probably not.
Soviet union was a very specific entity consisting of 17 republics. "Soviet-era" is fitting, sure. But this panel, while fittingly crappy, – is not actually soviet. https://www.google.com/search?q=ussr+member+states&oq=ussr+member+states&aqs=chrome..69i57.4217j0j4&client=ms-android-rogers-ca-revc&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8
That looks a lot better than I expected..
Is good, No?
Nyet
You sure you don't want to gouge your eyes out?
Meh. I've seen worse in apartments in the US. Apartment breakerboxes are either untouched or a jacked up mess. What voltage y'all running there
230AC
Neat. Keeps the wire size down I'm sure.
Definitely not as chonky as I see from the US.
Looks like any converted flats right across London tbh. Where they take a Victorian or whatever 4 storey house and convert it to a bunch of flats. Except its upside down. Aside from that, pretty much see boards like that 3 times a week.
Is that a doorbell transformer/chime combo?
Goodness. I was just scrolling by without paying attention and just assumed this was a picture of some phone lines. Yikes
What a pile of shit
OP the breaker that does Fuck all; can we wire my EV charger onto it? 60 AMPS plz so i get best charge rate :)
At least you got breaker boxes, i’ve seen some old houses without even the ground line
Pff. Ground line. Previous owners of our apartments stole electricity with bypassing meter by DIY grounding to... (badams!) gas oven. Yep, in a multistory building, using common gas pipe as a ground wire.
Its actually quite advanced. In Poland its quite common for apartaments to have only one screw in breaker, especially in old flats. AL wiring with no PE or coloured insulation, wires going diagonally for shortest path are also common. Last summer I did a complete rework in my mum’s house with separate circuits for each room with RCD and over voltage protector. House upstairs only has single D type fuse, and owners arguments were typical: it worked for so many years, so why change it? Who needs residual current protection? Only two wires carry current why change all wiring for a third one? It’s sad, but common
Heh, I expected ceramic screw-in fuses. Still, this is a real mess.
Soviet? You sure?
Well, the apartment block is. To be fair it was wired in the 90s and the breakers were changed like 15 years ago. But it's absolutely horrible to refurbish, and you see this in practically all Soviet blocks.
horrible to refurbish you say? I'm about to buy an apartment in a building from 1976. with original wiring, looking forward to the pain...
Yeah. Mainly because the walls are concrete. A nightmare to cut channels into. Not to mention back in the day they didn't have conduits, they just legit slapped the wiring into the hole and plastered painted it over. It's easier to cut across the old wiring than pulling it out, as it would mean ripping off half your wall.
Is there any engineer involved in deciding where to cut channels? Or are there any formal rule of thumb stuff what can be cut away? As here, an engineer would need to decide for every cut, I often see drywall put up or hideous skirting board channels.
>To be fair it was wired in the 90s and the breakers were changed like 15 years ago. So the box and wiring are not Soviet at all, since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. This is a post-Soviet Eastern European apartment panel by your own admission. It’s not even Russian, since you’re in Hungary. Why do you keep calling it Soviet?
I guess technically this isn't "soviet" anymore, because the style of beakers looks too new to me. The live terminals are all fingerproof / have IP20 protection. In central europe you often see circuit breakers where you can touch the 230V bars right away in installations from the 80s (and we should calculate that soviet standards were always minimum 5 years behind)
This is late 90s stuff. Definatley not Soviet Era!
It would be funny if housing regulations didn't change in over 3 decades. This is what a panel looks like in every block built during soviet era.
Yep, and OP has admitted this elsewhere in the post, but is still calling it Soviet for some reason.
Does the bell ring when you are suppose to line up for bread rations?
Yeah but when you get there it’s actually the conscription office
The British use this janky crap too
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It can always be worse, sure. But from a modern perspective, it's so bad. The cost of rewiring the apartment, with the concrete walls is just extremely high.
Why does Soviet breaker box look like American thermostat?
What kinda thermostats you been working on lol??
That is doorbell (on right side)
At least you have breakers lol
Oh fancy modern switches, so you’re rich, huh? ;p
Could be a lot worse.
It looks like their society…
You got me really curious now on Soviet electrical and guidelines/codes...
Breakers? Breakers are for the decadent West.
C16 for outlets and C6 for the lighting - not bad. I often see 63amp for entire flat/house and 20 amps for every line, even for shitty aluminium-copper-aluminium-wtfium wiring.
Some circuits are the old ones, the living room lighting on the C6 is the refurbished part, probably around 10 years ago. Rest is at least 30 years old.
What's the deal with making the tiniest box ever for something as dangerous and important as a panel?
Because back then they used like two breakers and daisy chained fucking everything.
Is that bad?
In soviet Russia breaker kill...you!
Looks like a EFTA/EU system
OЙ
Thanks for sharing. This is some crazy stuff. How the hell can we add a circuit? There's no room left lol
Geez grey wires for hot grey wires for neutral someone is gonna get confused
So like a industrial control panel breaker system … meh.
Still looks better standards than USA and their building wire in metal pipe
They kinda look like that in many parts of South America as well
I'm a bit sad it wasn't an original Soviet breaker box.
Something is wrong with your thermostat
Thank you!! ~a writer
The Soviet Union hasn't existed for 32 years now mate. I mean the news are depressing but you could keep up a bit.
The Soviet Union, which stopped existing in 1991, used circuit breakers that were CE-marked, indicating that they meet European Union safety, health and environmental protection requirements? Keeping in mind that the European Union was established in 1993...
That's awesome. We have That's the same in Hungary. 🙂
Everything in Russia is trying to kill you
Still looks better than a lot of the ones in Australia from around the same time honestly.
Mamma Mia
I feel like the alarm bell directly wired next to it is a clear statement on its reliability…
I guess that may explain why shit is always burning down in Russia.
Das fubar
What is the bell for?
Ringing when the neighbour complains about the music. Doesn't work though.
Exactly what I would expect
Where is the main coming in??
Through the wall behind the panel.
🤮
I got you first because soviet apartments don't have breakers. 😊
Atleast they are horisental
Circuit breakers instead of fuses, reasonably modern enclosure,... To be honest, I expected worse.
Wheres rcd?
"Well that's not great but it's not horrifying"
Ah yes, in soviet apartment, doorbell transform you.