alum trailer wiring

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-marty

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Alaska
I have a customer with an older trailer that has 10-2 alum for the branch circuits.

His's question is "should all the wiring be replaced?"

My advise was to replace wire in any walls that were being opened up but not to rip all the wall coverings off.

I looked in several device boxes and in the load center. Visually everything looks good.

How would you advise? thanks
 
Re: alum trailer wiring

Visual inspection of all connections and terminations is a good start. If no problems are visible, there probably aren't any. You may wish to take it a step further and perform insulation/resistance testing of the circuits to determine if any breakdown of the insulation is occurring. Taking generall temperature readings of loaded circuits will also indicate any potential problems.

If the homeowner is that concerned, have the owner install lots of smoke alarms and have hime keep all his valuable assests in a safe deposit box. If that seems unreasonable, perhaps a complete rewire is in order.
 
Re: alum trailer wiring

Another option you might consider is to set-up a maintenance agreement with the customer. You could come out once a year and check his wiring system for problems. You could also replace any burned out bulbs, change batteries in the smoke detectors, test GFCI's etc. Anything to add value to the service. It may be less expensive than a rewire, provide peace of mind for the customer, keep your company in front of the customer for future work or for referrals to his freinds. Also could provide work for you during slow times.
I have a voltage drop tester I use to check receptacles. Could you take readings of all his receptacles and record this information? Then the next time you went out you could take these readings again and compare them with the previous reading and see if there have been any changes.
I would think that if a connection started to develop a poor connection then it would show up on the voltage drop tester.

[ November 02, 2005, 09:18 AM: Message edited by: aline ]
 
Re: alum trailer wiring

Check the devices (receptacles, switches, etc.) to ensure that they are labelled for CU/AL conductors. The biggest problem with aluminum wiring is that the devices installed are often designed for copper conductors only. With the proper devices, installed properly, aluminum conductors should provide many years of trouble-free service.
 
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