Have I done some damage to the wiring?

shopnut · Mar 31, 2009

I had a little mishap the other day by driving a screw right into some existing wiring (believed to be Romex). It seems the electrician failed to install one of those little metal plates on the stud to protect wiring near the wall’s surface and the screw shorted-out two circuits (garbage disposal and the dining room circuit wires in the attached apartment). The breakers did their job by tripping and when I removed the screw, I was able to reset them and everything works fine now.

I’m a bit worried about it however and plan to investigate it further to see if wiring/insulation has been damaged. Certainly insulation has been punctured. I fear possibly the wires have been too but access to these wires is difficult.

Thoughts anybody? Should I be worried? Thanks in advance.

rickairmedic · Mar 31, 2009

Shopnut if it were me I would be in that wall right now making sure the wires are insulated ok and not able to arc against each other in the middle of the night while I was sleeping.

Rick

mrb · Mar 31, 2009

you absolutely need to expose the wire and repair / replace as necessary. You could have nicked a wire bad where it could heat up under load and cause a fire. You could also have a short waiting to happen that could throw sparks in the wall cavity and start a fire.

Aceman · Mar 31, 2009

I would definitely replace the damaged portion. Easiest way is plastic cut-in(old work) boxes used as j-boxes. I'd probably cut the boxes in a few inches before the screw damage, run the undamaged part of the wire into the box and run new wire from there to the garbage disposal/dining room. Then blank off the box.

I would absolutely not leave it as is.

-olllllllo- · Mar 31, 2009

flip those breakers off!!! tape a note to the box,"DO NOT TURN ON THESE BREAKERS #** AND#**" this way noone else inadvertantly turns them on.

cut the wall open at your earliest convenience, even if it isn't convenient, do it.

death is no more convenient than patching a small hole in the wall.

you will likely need to replace back to one outlet or the other, maybe both. might be able to use a junction box at the location of the break. (provided some fresh wire was pulled long from the outlet)

Tech Guy · Apr 1, 2009

As everyone mentioned above. Safety first as a fire can start real quick with arcing.

nadogail · Apr 1, 2009

I agree with previous posters about getting the wiring repaired immediatly. I would use old work boxes as suggested, but would consider putting one on either side of the damaged area and splicing in a short length of romex to replace the damaged wiring. You don't need to worry about what size wire, just use 12 guage. You might consider adding a receptacle rather than a blank cover (so that it will look less ke an oops).

Scotto · Apr 1, 2009

You definitely need to open up the wall and see what damage you did. Even though the breaker did not trip after you removed the screw, you can still have crazy arching going on in the wall.

I'd probably put in 2 work boxes vs opening up the whole wall and running new wire to the next switch/receptacle.

shopnut · Apr 1, 2009

Thanks for the responses and great suggestions guys/gals - it looks like I have a little sideline project this weekend.

I guess I wasn't really expecting anyone to say "Don't worry about it" but many answers to the contrary comfirms the urgency to open it up asap. I agree that even though things seem okay with the breakers back on, those wires could be reduced in diameter and heating up badly under a load or simply just touching now and ready to cause an arc at any time.

Thanks again for taking the time to warn me. Fire is my biggest fear with this place as insurance will never be able to reimburse the sweat and tears that I've put into this place.

-olllllllo- · Apr 1, 2009

i trust that since you have not repaired this yet, that you have those breakers off, correct???

if not, shut em off now!!! leave them off until the repair is done.

don't chance your family's lives.

Tech Guy · Apr 2, 2009

and remember you cant have a hidden junction. So if you do repair it the junctions have to be accessible such as using them for a spare receptacle or something.

shopnut · Apr 5, 2009

All is well!

I made full repairs yesterday. What I didn't tell you in the first post was that the damage occurred near a junction box. I lucked out and there was enough slack to pull the damaged portion of the wires into the box (don't worry, I didn't cause any damage further down the run). What I found was two nicked hot wires and one completely diconnected ground wire. I'm guessing the screw pierced the insulation on the two black wires first and then went further in to finally arc and blow apart the ground wire. The actual copper in the hot wires looked fine but I cut it out anyway just to be sure. The neutrals had some arc flash on them but the insulation was fine.

So the bottom line is even though things seemed to work properly before I fixed it, one circuit was actually missing the safety ground, and that is definitely unsafe.

Have I done some damage to the wiring?

shopnut

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rickairmedic

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mrb

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Aceman

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-olllllllo-

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Tech Guy

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nadogail

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Scotto

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shopnut

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-olllllllo-

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Tech Guy

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shopnut

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