In message <3.0.1.32.19990925123940.00943b10@mail.unidot.com>, Robert M. McClure writes >At 04:58 PM 9/24/99 -0800, Dan Larson wrote: >>On Fri, 24 Sep 1999 17:48:07 -0400, Robert A. LaBudde wrote: >> >>............ >> >>Anyone here have an old house with bare exposed wiring in the attic >>separated only by ceramic insulators? No *that's* scary ! >> >>Dan >> >Don't have such a house now, but grew up in one. My grandfather built >a house in East Texas in 1921-1922, which had the type of wiring you >describe. It is called "knob and tube" wiring, for the knobs holding >the wires, and the ceramic tubes through holes in the framing through >which the wires ran. When in high-school the house was renovated and the >wiring (almost all of it) replaced with "Romex". That was in 1950. >I was interested in learning the techniques and asked the electrician >if I could help. I wound up doing all the work and he got paid. I received >my pay in education, for which I have been grateful ever since. For >the record, knob and tube was considered obsolete before WWII. I've never seen or heard of that in the UK, perhaps with the higher voltage it was never done?. The oldest I've seen are linen or rubber covered live and neutral with an outer sheathing of lead. The lead outer is used as the earth connection!. There are still probably quite a few houses in the UK with wiring like this, but it's EXTREMELY!! dangerous. The linen/rubber perishes over the years and if you touch it, it just crumbles away, leaving bare conductors inside a lead casing!. -- Nigel. /--------------------------------------------------------------\ | Nigel Goodwin | Internet : nigelg@lpilsley.demon.co.uk | | Lower Pilsley | Web Page : http://www.lpilsley.demon.co.uk | | Chesterfield | Official site for Shin Ki and New Spirit | | England | Ju Jitsu | \--------------------------------------------------------------/