Rant: A loose neutral at a panel in Akron cost me 4 hours

I was troubleshooting intermittent flickering lights in a house built in the 70s and finally found a loose neutral on the main bus bar. It was barely finger tight from a previous install and had been arcing just enough to drive me crazy. Has anyone else found shoddy work hidden behind a panel cover like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

wyatt_shah854d agoProlific Poster

Man, that hits close to home. Found a similar mess in a house from the 80s where the neutral bar had a screw that was basically stripped from someone overtightening it. The wire was just barely hanging on, and the flickering only showed up when the AC compressor kicked on. Spent a whole afternoon tracing a ghost problem that was just a loose connection hidden behind a mass of other wires. It's amazing how often the previous guy's "good enough" becomes someone else's nightmare, right?

amybarnes4d ago

Oh man, you just described about half the houses I've been in! It's like everyone who touched electrical work before 2000 had this attitude of "if it's tight enough to strip the screw, it's tight enough for life." And that thing you said about the ghost problem? That's exactly it. I've noticed that pattern everywhere, not just in wiring. People rush through stuff, cover it up, call it good, and then someone else has to untangle the mess years later. It's like the whole world runs on "it's fine for now" until suddenly it's not.