Lights Flickering

[charlie]

A friend of mine called and said in his home his lights keep flickering. . .

Is this a single circuit or the whole house? If it is common to the entire home, it is probably caused by the serving electric utility having too small of a service drop, secondary conductors, transformer or a combination or any of the above or a loose connection. To correct the problem, the transformer, secondary, or service drop needs to be up sized or the transformer needs to be moved closer to the home. Make sure it is not an electric utility problem before spending a lot of cash that does a minimal amount of good.

 

[greg y]

Just a circuit, not the whole house at once or anything like that found one kitchen light where the wire had already burned back about 3-4 inches and had to replace that part and there is more. Trying to talk him into rewireing the house with copper but don,t know if he will.

 

[physis]

Just a circuit, not the whole house at once or anything like that found one kitchen light where the wire had already burned back about 3-4 inches and had to replace that part and there is more. Trying to talk him into rewireing the house with copper but don,t know if he will.

That's a pretty big job on an occupied residence, maybe a room at a time. :smile:

 

[K8MHZ]

Just a circuit, not the whole house at once or anything like that found one kitchen light where the wire had already burned back about 3-4 inches and had to replace that part and there is more.

Just as long as he shuts off the main before he goes to bed, what's the problem?

 

[izak]

you know, there are devices made these days made SPECIFICALLY for Aluminum terminations...
30 years ago, everything used steel screws. that is what caused so many problems with the OLD aluminum alloy.

these days you can replace ALL devices with CO/ALR and for the connections that you cannot use a CO/ALR device, you can use a insulated 2 barrel splice lug (such as those made by Polaris) to do the copper to aluminum connections.

I have read within the last 6 or 8 months that Ideal purple wirenuts had lost their listing or were no longer approved for copper to AL connections.

when you consider the cost of two or three purple wirenuts to pigtail out to copper versus a CO/ALR rated switch or receptacle, i would think it would be better to use the device.