guyakaguy
New User
- Location
- Minneapolis
- Occupation
- Stationary Engineer
Hi all,
I’ve been lurking around here for a while and finally joined. I’m not an electrician by trade, but I have a fairly good knowledge and experience with electrical work and run into lots of things in my trade as an operating engineer.
Anyway, I’m buying a house that has aluminum wiring and, because I have zero experience with aluminum, I figured I’d open what is likely to be a can of worms here.
My first step is I’m getting a new electrical panel installed by a pro. There were a couple double-taps on the power side and several on the neutral buss and no slots to add additional breakers. I’m going to go with a 40 slot 150A panel, which is an additional 10 slots more than the 1973 GE panel has. I’m assuming all circuits will be arc-faults and gfci breakers will be put in where applicable. That’s step # 1.
Due to the difficulty in obtaining proper replacement CU/AL outlets and switches, and the impossibility of obtaining CU/AL GFCIs, I’ve been thinking about picking away at pigtailing the outlets and switches, lights, and visible junctions with copper. I’ve read a lot about the CU/AL Twisters and the AlumiConns, but have also read that genuine Wagos can be used if their aluminum contact paste is used.
Assuming that box space is adequate to install any of these, and unless I’m missing a method of pigtailing, which is the preferred method of pigtailing from aluminum to copper? There seems to be a lot of division about which of these is best/safest, so if you have any objections or reservations about using any of these methods, I’d appreciate any feedback.
Thanks in advance!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I’ve been lurking around here for a while and finally joined. I’m not an electrician by trade, but I have a fairly good knowledge and experience with electrical work and run into lots of things in my trade as an operating engineer.
Anyway, I’m buying a house that has aluminum wiring and, because I have zero experience with aluminum, I figured I’d open what is likely to be a can of worms here.
My first step is I’m getting a new electrical panel installed by a pro. There were a couple double-taps on the power side and several on the neutral buss and no slots to add additional breakers. I’m going to go with a 40 slot 150A panel, which is an additional 10 slots more than the 1973 GE panel has. I’m assuming all circuits will be arc-faults and gfci breakers will be put in where applicable. That’s step # 1.
Due to the difficulty in obtaining proper replacement CU/AL outlets and switches, and the impossibility of obtaining CU/AL GFCIs, I’ve been thinking about picking away at pigtailing the outlets and switches, lights, and visible junctions with copper. I’ve read a lot about the CU/AL Twisters and the AlumiConns, but have also read that genuine Wagos can be used if their aluminum contact paste is used.
Assuming that box space is adequate to install any of these, and unless I’m missing a method of pigtailing, which is the preferred method of pigtailing from aluminum to copper? There seems to be a lot of division about which of these is best/safest, so if you have any objections or reservations about using any of these methods, I’d appreciate any feedback.
Thanks in advance!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
