odd romex -time period?

Status
Not open for further replies.
peter d

peter d

Senior Member
Location
New England
The buildings we're currently working on are wired with some old type NM cable that I don't run across too often. It's plastic jacketed, not cloth, but the jacket is almost like Type UF cable. It has a green insulated #18 or #16 solid ground wire. It was made by "Narax" which if I'm not mistaken, is a long-gone brand of AIW, back when NM cable was made locally here in New England.

Any idea on when this odd stuff was made?

Oh, and the #16 grounds are just twisted together without a connector. No bonding to the metal boxes or anything else. Very typical for this time period.
 
Just today we did a trouble-shoot in a house with NM that contained a light brown, not black, ungrounded conductor color.
 
black anaconda sealtite

black anaconda sealtite

About 10 yrs ago I was on a roof looking at an ac unit and noticing tha sealtite came in black color. Never having seen this before I opened the disconnect to find the conductors were alluminun and the insulation was burned back all the way to the metal bushing about to explode. what had happened was a screw in the unit pierced a wire and no ground conductor was pulled in thru the sealtitite. The conductor conducted the short to ground down to the last clamp on the steel where it changed to sealtite yet was not a good enough ground to clear the breaker. Moral of the story when you see a funny color do not assume it started with this color.
 
Yes I have seen that baby-blue, I used in the mid 80's. The brown I have seen used in houses from the 70's. There is also the gray or silver cloth coverd, not sure when that was used.
Lou
 
I found out that the buildings in question with this odd romex was built around 1964-65. It's old military housing that was converted to apartments, and now condos.


busman said:
Anyone seen the baby-blue colored romex?
Click to expand...

Yes, and I believe it was made by Southwire. So I guess they were way ahead of the curve with the white/yellow/orange romex "invention."
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top