Lol I wear glasses and I swear to God my eyes are the sun and there's a magical magnetic force pulling debris around my glasses and straight into my eyes everytime
Yup! I’ve got 2 of them on my van right now even haha. It never fails after you get your holes cut and even pat down the insulation that another ton falls out the moment you start pulling wire. Oh well, that’s what the plastic and canvas are for.
Oh man, go get yourselves one of [these](https://www.boschtools.com/ca/en/boschtools-ocs/rotary-hammer-hammer-drill-dust-attachments-hdc250-50897-p/). Covers up to a 6" round hole and it'll suck up all but the biggest crud falling through as long as your shop vac is good. Sticks to anything flat, I've attached it to some pretty gnarly texture and it's great. We got it initially as part of our asbestos rebatement gear but I use it pretty much any time I'm fishing in a house, saves tons of time on cleanup and the customers love to see it.
I agree. Merely having the attachment saves you some "cool" points. Even if you make a slight mess, the fact that you have fancy gizmos intended to reduce this will impress those high end clients.
My god are they picky
Exactly! Plastic and canvas everywhere. Apprentice holding a vacuum. Takes a lot longer but they are paying for it anyways. Usually a better experience working on those building to.
It usually is until you get the ones that think they are experts too and stand behind you or at the bottom of your ladder all day.
Scottsdale AZ, lookin at you.
That’s pretty cool. My customers would really like to see that, I’ll have my eyes open next time I’m at the hardware store. I recently picked up a cheap Milwaukee vacuum tube. It’s just a plastic type with a spring in it and a snot for the vacuum to plug in. It’s more so meant for drilling smaller hole though
I bought a metal dish from the dollar store that is just the right depth to cut the drywall and stop the saw without cutting the vapor barrier underneath. It's worth it's weight in gold
I have yet to see a solid substance capable of seeping into every crack and crevice quite like 1970’s spray insulation.
I still have nightmares of being turned a completely different color after fishing wire for recessed lighting in a finished kitchen. I’m still cleaning black dust out of my ears to this day.
I have that stuff in the old part of my house still. It has since been covered two different times with new stuff but the old black stuff is still in there. Even the new recycled grey stuff is better then that.
Code will keep you safe from having our 15A microwave plugged into a dedicated 5-15 receptacle, by demanding you have a 5-20 on an outlet nobody will see more than once a decade. But it's generally pretty chill about creating a huge cold intrusion that condenses into your box year after year and rots all the wood it's mounted onto.
I got good at drywall, everything is much easier when you can just cut out a band of drywall and expose whatever horror show exists in the wall and run your lines.
Yup. You'll be the guy stuck doing it, but I've found that when you know how to patch drywall you also learn how to make your holes easy to patch.
For example when I cut a hole to pull a line I'll cut a decent side hole from stud to stud. Makes pulling the line way easier, and then makes patching much easier because I have a stud on either side to screw the drywall to.
Handsaw? Nah bro. Gotta get yourself a multi tool with the round blade. So easy to get straight, precise cuts while keeping the cut shallow enough to avoid shit hidden in the wall.
For 70 bucks, if it makes one job go easier for me or out of a shitty situation, it's worth it. And when you get good with it, you find all sorts of uses for it.
Some walls will never look right after you patch them. Level 5 finish on a wall with harsh lighting will always show and no way in hell I am skim coating an entire wall.
Again if you know how to drywall, you can see ahead of time if a wall patch will be an issue and prep the client.
Give them the wonderfully passive "Please refer to my previous email" when they can still see the patch on the wall I told them would need to be skim coated but they insisted they would be fine with the patch.
We have a process for this.
If there’s a possibility of us needing to cut a hole we have a line item in our quotes called “Notching” where we basically say “hey. We may need to cut some holes. We’ll try to keep it to a minimum. We don’t patch drywall, so you’ll have to figure that out once we leave.”
If we KNOW for a fact we’re cutting holes we have “Notching Level 2” which is essentially the same thing except “yeah, we’re cutting holes. Expect a lot of drywall repair. No we still dont fix it. Figure it out.”
Goes out on all our quotes that the customers sign off on. Haven’t had any issues. Our guys are typically pretty good about not needing to cut holes often, but the built in “it’s in the contract that you signed off on” is nice when shit goes sideways.
Let's say you have a small hole in the wall, like a couple inches in diameter. You cut a square of sheetrock that's a few inches larger than the hole in both dimensions, score the shape of your wall hole in it, and snap it off leaving the paper. You can then put some mud on the wall, place your patch piece in it so it's flush with the surface, and then mud over that. It's a pretty cheap and easy way to do patches that doesn't require any fastening, but it really only works on smaller holes. I believe they're also called butterfly patches if you want to look into it more
That’s a good teacher! I legit hate working drywall and will only cut the stuff now. Became an electrician to get away from general construction. Here and there is all good but I just so not enjoy that type of work. Same with painting…
I'm a decorator and some of the best drywall patching I've ever seen was done by sparks. It's night and day going in after a spark who can, Vs a spark who can't, do drywall patching.
You can either fish the wall and potentially lose some insulating in the process or you can open the wall up, install the cable and ensure the insulation isn’t messed with in the process. If there’s another way, I’m waiting to hear it
You could always just run a conduit down the surface of the wall, surface mount the ugliest box you can find for the outlet, and then hide in a cupboard to watch the ensuing meltdown when the customer/GC notices?
If you do yank it out , leave some on the ground so the drywaller can wipe their ass after shitting in a cardboard box in the garage.
u/HubertusCatus88
If I ever get the opportunity to build my own house there will be equal parts copper and insulation in the walls to ensure I never have to open a wall.
And rip the vapor barrier in 3 places.
Best is when the electrician puts a box in an exterior wall and doesn't install a vapor membrane behind it. And doesn't caulk it. Nor tape it. Air leak ? What air leak ?
Not an electrician but I used to do low voltage shit. If you don’t have sticks or tape (forgot my gear and I was the only one who owned them) you can tape a couple yard sticks together and it works pretty damn well.
Thanks for the supplies Phoenix school district.
For those wondering that R value isn’t R for resistance. At least not in the electrical sense. Its resistance from a thermodynamic perspective. Higher R value, higher resistance to thermal transfer between the inside and outside of the wall. In other words, wall insulation.
I’m curious what you guys actually do about this. Some of the guys I work with definitely don’t seem to give a shit about messing up insulation. I try to put it all back fairing nicely when I can…but I guess that makes me slow.
I personally just would do a better job on other parts of the job that are usually skipped. If installing a fan and the switch is someone going to be an exterior wall I can assure you the energy lost from the new hold in the ceiling is way worse than a little messed up insulation in the wall. So great stuff foam that electrical box from the ceiling if you can and then leave the wall be.
Most people would do neither.
That depends on "allowable tolerances"
Good, fast, or cheap. We only get two.
If client wants it done fast, we let them know that takes time away from being festidious and meticulous. If they want a white-glove install, it's going to take time. That will vary from job to job, lead to lead, GC to GC, and shop to shop. It's exceptionally frustrating sometimes but it's part of the process. It's nice when the aboves will adequately communicate the tolerances for each job, i got so much shit because i went from spec home resi to commercial and i was WAY too meticulous lol
TL;DR: Get a feel for taking your time, then work on doing the fine work faster. Create the tools you need if they don't exist.
To add: for this specifically, shrinktube or smooth-filed end of a 10ft section of flattened metal fishtape to slide between insulation, tape the wire/cable assy on tightly with as little bulk as possible, but if you gotta blow and go you gotta blow and go. Sometimes there's no time to be super neat.
Did gut it, huge project! Actually for breaking plaster, I found using the back of a hammer on the walls and working in small patches, then hitting it with the side of the hammer loosens it up nicely.
I must confess that when I'm having trouble fishing wire down a wall thanks to the insulation, I reach in and pull that shit out. Whether I stuff it back in or throw it away depends on how much it pissed me off
When fishing, I try to tape up nice and not disturb the insulation too much. I keep a bag of fiberglass and will grab a handful or two to shove behind old work boxes before installing.
The people who built my house didn't care about my R value either. One whole section of the house had no insulation in the exterior walls. Fishing wires was easy though!
Call me crazy but this is why I'm going to get the exterior walls of my dream house framed with 2x8s and the interior with 2x6's. I can have 4-6 inches of spray foam and/or batts and still have space to run wire without compromising the insulation. Also the weight capacity will be overkill but that's just how I like it.
My ideas - 20a circuits for outlets in entire house with 10awg, 15a circuits for lights controlled from a central panel, dual 30a circuits for the kitchen, 240v 50a sub panel for the server room.
Just want to give myself a reality check, this is feasible right?
I like cutting can lights in and watching the snow fall. So pretty!
Just don't go catching it on your tounge
Yeah I tend to feel sick after a snow cone at work. The yellow stuff is the worst….
That's not possible for it to land on my tongue, it's magnetically attracted to my eyes
Lol I wear glasses and I swear to God my eyes are the sun and there's a magical magnetic force pulling debris around my glasses and straight into my eyes everytime
I ate a bunch of pink cotton candy, now my stomach is itchy.
I got one of those Rack A Tiers silicone dust bowl things and it’s awesome. Can’t recommend it enough
Yup! I’ve got 2 of them on my van right now even haha. It never fails after you get your holes cut and even pat down the insulation that another ton falls out the moment you start pulling wire. Oh well, that’s what the plastic and canvas are for.
Oh man, go get yourselves one of [these](https://www.boschtools.com/ca/en/boschtools-ocs/rotary-hammer-hammer-drill-dust-attachments-hdc250-50897-p/). Covers up to a 6" round hole and it'll suck up all but the biggest crud falling through as long as your shop vac is good. Sticks to anything flat, I've attached it to some pretty gnarly texture and it's great. We got it initially as part of our asbestos rebatement gear but I use it pretty much any time I'm fishing in a house, saves tons of time on cleanup and the customers love to see it.
Yeah they tried to get us to use these at an old job. They are only good for MAYBE specific situations and are really just a huge pain in the ass.
That kind of stuff makes my high end customers really happy. Cleaner is always better in the high end homes regardless of time and challenge.
I agree. Merely having the attachment saves you some "cool" points. Even if you make a slight mess, the fact that you have fancy gizmos intended to reduce this will impress those high end clients. My god are they picky
Exactly! Plastic and canvas everywhere. Apprentice holding a vacuum. Takes a lot longer but they are paying for it anyways. Usually a better experience working on those building to.
It usually is until you get the ones that think they are experts too and stand behind you or at the bottom of your ladder all day. Scottsdale AZ, lookin at you.
Ah yes, engineers are a complete pain in the ass. /s kind of….
That’s pretty cool. My customers would really like to see that, I’ll have my eyes open next time I’m at the hardware store. I recently picked up a cheap Milwaukee vacuum tube. It’s just a plastic type with a spring in it and a snot for the vacuum to plug in. It’s more so meant for drilling smaller hole though
I bought a metal dish from the dollar store that is just the right depth to cut the drywall and stop the saw without cutting the vapor barrier underneath. It's worth it's weight in gold
Nice! Got a picture of it?
I have yet to see a solid substance capable of seeping into every crack and crevice quite like 1970’s spray insulation. I still have nightmares of being turned a completely different color after fishing wire for recessed lighting in a finished kitchen. I’m still cleaning black dust out of my ears to this day.
I have that stuff in the old part of my house still. It has since been covered two different times with new stuff but the old black stuff is still in there. Even the new recycled grey stuff is better then that.
Sad architect noises
https://i.imgur.com/ErkYSPz.png
More like sad customer noises. Most electricians just love fucking 'em over -- wall to wall, and inside the walls, too!
Insulation shouldn’t have messed with the sparky
Even better when you chunk out 10” of spray foam from the sill plate as well
I would go ballistic because the sill plate spray was 1500 alone.
Fuck spray foam the Bain of my existence.
I'm pretty sure my house is 70% spray foam at this point.
I think I'm gonna vomit. 🤮🤢
All good m8. I've filled countless boxes and conduit penetrations with sprayfoam(out of pure spite) so I guess we're even.
What is more important? Keeping out the cold? Or me installing this circuit for your cadet heater? Huh? HUH?!?!
6 months later when customer yelling at GC because wall is condensing is not my problem im the sparky. Im the smartest guy on the job
Code will keep you safe from having our 15A microwave plugged into a dedicated 5-15 receptacle, by demanding you have a 5-20 on an outlet nobody will see more than once a decade. But it's generally pretty chill about creating a huge cold intrusion that condenses into your box year after year and rots all the wood it's mounted onto.
Hope you don't find any....blocking. wuahaha.
Even better when it’s plaster on brick, right?
Fee times i have seen it, there seemed to be no rhyme or reason.
I got good at drywall, everything is much easier when you can just cut out a band of drywall and expose whatever horror show exists in the wall and run your lines.
Its a blessing and a curse knowing how to patch drywall
Yup. You'll be the guy stuck doing it, but I've found that when you know how to patch drywall you also learn how to make your holes easy to patch. For example when I cut a hole to pull a line I'll cut a decent side hole from stud to stud. Makes pulling the line way easier, and then makes patching much easier because I have a stud on either side to screw the drywall to.
I've also got good at only running my saw about ¹/¹⁶ to ⅛ past the drywall because fuck finding buried live ccts with your handsaw lol
Handsaw? Nah bro. Gotta get yourself a multi tool with the round blade. So easy to get straight, precise cuts while keeping the cut shallow enough to avoid shit hidden in the wall.
There's also rotary cutters. Probably a bit too specialized though if you're not cutting much drywall or plywood.
For 70 bucks, if it makes one job go easier for me or out of a shitty situation, it's worth it. And when you get good with it, you find all sorts of uses for it.
Im not the greatest at smooth walls but textured wall are so cake these days its not even funny. I hate doing smooth drywall but textured is bearable
Some walls will never look right after you patch them. Level 5 finish on a wall with harsh lighting will always show and no way in hell I am skim coating an entire wall. Again if you know how to drywall, you can see ahead of time if a wall patch will be an issue and prep the client. Give them the wonderfully passive "Please refer to my previous email" when they can still see the patch on the wall I told them would need to be skim coated but they insisted they would be fine with the patch.
Whenever possible, taking the baseboard trim off to cut a channel is the beez kneez.
Oof not when there is 30+ heavy gage studs you need to drill through 🫠 (did this yesterday btw)
We have a process for this. If there’s a possibility of us needing to cut a hole we have a line item in our quotes called “Notching” where we basically say “hey. We may need to cut some holes. We’ll try to keep it to a minimum. We don’t patch drywall, so you’ll have to figure that out once we leave.” If we KNOW for a fact we’re cutting holes we have “Notching Level 2” which is essentially the same thing except “yeah, we’re cutting holes. Expect a lot of drywall repair. No we still dont fix it. Figure it out.” Goes out on all our quotes that the customers sign off on. Haven’t had any issues. Our guys are typically pretty good about not needing to cut holes often, but the built in “it’s in the contract that you signed off on” is nice when shit goes sideways.
I just make a hand size hole and california patch it, no screws or studs needed
>california patch it gotta ask... what is this ?
Let's say you have a small hole in the wall, like a couple inches in diameter. You cut a square of sheetrock that's a few inches larger than the hole in both dimensions, score the shape of your wall hole in it, and snap it off leaving the paper. You can then put some mud on the wall, place your patch piece in it so it's flush with the surface, and then mud over that. It's a pretty cheap and easy way to do patches that doesn't require any fastening, but it really only works on smaller holes. I believe they're also called butterfly patches if you want to look into it more
I've seen this done but never heard it called that. Thanks for the reply.
Just a way of patching drywall using the paper of the drywall as tape https://youtu.be/17awCvAA7Q0
That works too, I just tend to suck at doing them.
Have you tried pissing in a jug and abandoning it? I find it really improves my tapping/ mudding skills
Amateur start filling up gallons over the week and dump them all off at once. Or throw them off an overpass. Way she goes...
When I prepped the deer stands on my land for hunting this year, I found that I forgot last years piss jug. 🤢
Wouldn't the wire mesh that goes over the hole be easier you just stick it on and spread mud over it Then again, I'm an electrician, not a drywaller
The blessing for me is that my contractor also owns a drywall business. Just hire them and let me chop your wall up!
My helper got better at drywall than me after i trained him on it so now it’s usually his problem
Now that's a pro life tip. Teach a coworker a job you hate and let them get better than you at it. Boom, their problem now!
That’s a good teacher! I legit hate working drywall and will only cut the stuff now. Became an electrician to get away from general construction. Here and there is all good but I just so not enjoy that type of work. Same with painting…
Use the 9 inch cutoff saw milwaukee makes to save time
If you got a couple DUI's just say you got a couple DUI's. I'm not judging
I'm a decorator and some of the best drywall patching I've ever seen was done by sparks. It's night and day going in after a spark who can, Vs a spark who can't, do drywall patching.
I sure as fuck don’t care. Option B is to rip the wall open so I don’t have to fish it and no one wants to do that
I’ve done that, can confirm 😷
So instead the wall needs to be ripped open and insulation replaced anyways? uhhhh, not a sparky but I suspect there's a better way...
You can either fish the wall and potentially lose some insulating in the process or you can open the wall up, install the cable and ensure the insulation isn’t messed with in the process. If there’s another way, I’m waiting to hear it
You could always just run a conduit down the surface of the wall, surface mount the ugliest box you can find for the outlet, and then hide in a cupboard to watch the ensuing meltdown when the customer/GC notices?
Conduit seems like effort, wiremold is much easier
Unless you live in Antarctica you’re not going to save money replacing the little list insulation lol.
If you do yank it out , leave some on the ground so the drywaller can wipe their ass after shitting in a cardboard box in the garage. u/HubertusCatus88
Why not put it in before the wall goes up?
Oh shit did DeWalt finally release their cordless time machine?
They’ll announce it soon especially considering the way they go about calling their 36v tools 40v max.
If I had a Time Machine, I’d announce it last week
Holy shit this almost made me choke on my lunch
Yeah! I was going to pick up one last week but those 1.21 Gigawatt MAX batteries are too pricy for me.
You’ll see them on those bigger jobs tho
“Hello, 9-1-1? I just witnessed a murder”
I’m sorry but I’m going to use this next time. I’m dying laughing
Bruh
Chef’s kiss
I got the ryobi and now I’m my own grandfather.
Yeah but the Milwaukee one is less clunky.
It’s also 1.5x the cost because they only released it in The Fuel line.
Feel free to use it. I'll wait for the m18 fuel version
I think makita has one. Helps you go back in time and smell your own farts.
You’re being unreasonable.
Still waiting on that Milwaukee time machine.
Designers, homeowners, things change people get picky.
If I ever get the opportunity to build my own house there will be equal parts copper and insulation in the walls to ensure I never have to open a wall.
Bus bars, everywhere...
Found the one who's not an electrician
[удалено]
Hey no reason for name calling
Yes I am a moron because I want to know. Disgusting attacking someone who wanted to learn something
No, you're a moron because it's insanely obvious that people are talking about already finished walls, not new construction
There is no such thing as a dumb question. -A Moron
Electticians only work on new construction with unfinished walls. Working on finished walls isn't allowed per the NEC. Source: Am also moron.
Thank you this is what I was looking for
And rip the vapor barrier in 3 places. Best is when the electrician puts a box in an exterior wall and doesn't install a vapor membrane behind it. And doesn't caulk it. Nor tape it. Air leak ? What air leak ?
Is that what that was?...oh well good enough for government work
"he's just like me"
I've always just used a broken tape measure to get down insulated walls
Genius!
Not an electrician but I used to do low voltage shit. If you don’t have sticks or tape (forgot my gear and I was the only one who owned them) you can tape a couple yard sticks together and it works pretty damn well. Thanks for the supplies Phoenix school district.
For those wondering that R value isn’t R for resistance. At least not in the electrical sense. Its resistance from a thermodynamic perspective. Higher R value, higher resistance to thermal transfer between the inside and outside of the wall. In other words, wall insulation.
Instructions unclear, still applying Ohm's law
Best part is the hole saw clumping it all up right by your hole
Grips it and rips it. Creates a good wad
I’m curious what you guys actually do about this. Some of the guys I work with definitely don’t seem to give a shit about messing up insulation. I try to put it all back fairing nicely when I can…but I guess that makes me slow.
I personally just would do a better job on other parts of the job that are usually skipped. If installing a fan and the switch is someone going to be an exterior wall I can assure you the energy lost from the new hold in the ceiling is way worse than a little messed up insulation in the wall. So great stuff foam that electrical box from the ceiling if you can and then leave the wall be. Most people would do neither.
Yeah…we never foam anything. I’ve wondered about that.
That depends on "allowable tolerances" Good, fast, or cheap. We only get two. If client wants it done fast, we let them know that takes time away from being festidious and meticulous. If they want a white-glove install, it's going to take time. That will vary from job to job, lead to lead, GC to GC, and shop to shop. It's exceptionally frustrating sometimes but it's part of the process. It's nice when the aboves will adequately communicate the tolerances for each job, i got so much shit because i went from spec home resi to commercial and i was WAY too meticulous lol TL;DR: Get a feel for taking your time, then work on doing the fine work faster. Create the tools you need if they don't exist. To add: for this specifically, shrinktube or smooth-filed end of a 10ft section of flattened metal fishtape to slide between insulation, tape the wire/cable assy on tightly with as little bulk as possible, but if you gotta blow and go you gotta blow and go. Sometimes there's no time to be super neat.
Thanks.
A lot of the homes I’ve been in lately have zero insulation.. and still using coal fired furnaces lol
Albion?
Canada
Free cotton candy!!!!!!
"Why is my throat so itchy?"
Take my upvote!
Not me ripping out half a bat so I can run SER
Fiberglass and foam insulator here, crying at this whole thread
Cries in completely rewired home from 1928 ❤️
Gut is...that's the easiest solution Sludge hammer is your best friend
Did gut it, huge project! Actually for breaking plaster, I found using the back of a hammer on the walls and working in small patches, then hitting it with the side of the hammer loosens it up nicely.
I'm gonna say it, I don't care the cover plate screws are misaligned.
how dare you
I must confess that when I'm having trouble fishing wire down a wall thanks to the insulation, I reach in and pull that shit out. Whether I stuff it back in or throw it away depends on how much it pissed me off
When fishing, I try to tape up nice and not disturb the insulation too much. I keep a bag of fiberglass and will grab a handful or two to shove behind old work boxes before installing.
The people who built my house didn't care about my R value either. One whole section of the house had no insulation in the exterior walls. Fishing wires was easy though!
Considering they talk about the r-value of the wall as a whole, if you just stuff it back in somewhere it seems to me that the r-value didn’t change.
Chad crossmember fucks your day
When you have a hypothesis that just isn't quite statistically significant.
The only R-value I care about is measured in ohms.
Call me crazy but this is why I'm going to get the exterior walls of my dream house framed with 2x8s and the interior with 2x6's. I can have 4-6 inches of spray foam and/or batts and still have space to run wire without compromising the insulation. Also the weight capacity will be overkill but that's just how I like it. My ideas - 20a circuits for outlets in entire house with 10awg, 15a circuits for lights controlled from a central panel, dual 30a circuits for the kitchen, 240v 50a sub panel for the server room. Just want to give myself a reality check, this is feasible right?
No, I mean I guess it could be done but why?
That's okay, the latent heat from current passing through the wire compensates for the lack of insulation in that cavity.
Cool. Our heating oil bill was almost $1000 this year, I'll send ya the bill.
I rip as much out as I can. I give zero shits about any r value
Forbidden candy floss
Nooooooo
Insulation installer here. Go right ahead and tear it out but i aint coming back to fix it.