Charging leaf at friends home

[Valdemar]

Interesting, I'm obviously not an expert but based on my reading about this subject I was under the impression than Al wiring was pretty much phased out by the end of the 70's. The good news is that your wiring is almost likely done with a 8000 series alloy which is said to be less susceptible to problems attributed to aluminum wiring than the older 1350 wiring used prior to circa 1972.

I was shocked to find out too that AL wiring was even approved, much less still in use, in 1981. I know in the mid 70's there were already many concerns about it.

As for the EVSE tax credit, double check you can claim it. If you pay AMT there is a good chance you cannot.

My tax liability for the last several years has exceeded the $7500 Federal credit for EVs, so I should not have any issues with this credit. I leased and did not buy so I don't expect running into AMT issues.

The EVSE credit is more complicated than the $7500 credit for EVs. I don't see how leasing can have anything to do with AMT which usually kicks in if you are in a higher tax bracket or in some other situations, such as exercising but not selling ISO stock options. If you did your 2012 taxes yourself with, say, Turbo Tax, you can check if you could claim the credit last year, if you could and your financial situation didn't change significantly this year you likely can claim it. I thought I could, but it turned out I was wrong.

 

[Valdemar]

Ripping out and starting fresh would be horrifically expensive, as my home was not built with metal wiring conduit (and I suspect neither is Valdemar's, given his response).

Al wire is never run through a conduit, it is NM (aka Romex) cable that runs directly in the walls. As far as rewiring costs, it really depends. It should somewhere $150 per outlet/receptacle/light which includes patching plus any additional drywall damage repair and painting.

 

[Valdemar]

I'll vouch for the Alumiconn connectors. I bought a box of 100 of them and pigtailed almost all the outlets and switches in my mom's 1973 townhouse. It was probably overkill, but I wanted to replace all the outlets and switches anyway, so while I was in there.... Man, it is time consuming! If I had to do it again, I would probably only pick the outlets that tend to serve heavy loads. The original electrician had just used regular wire nuts with no anti-oxidant compound. Definitely not a good idea.

One problem with Al wire that many electricians don't even know how to work with it. With partial pigtailing you need to be really careful, as some outlets can be daisy-chained, and a circuit failure does not necessarily happen in the one where the heavy load is plugged in. Even if all outlets were pigtailed, can one be absolutely sure some moron didn't create a splice and covered it with drywall previously?

AlumiConn connectors are pretty big, and if a box is pretty full already it may be impossible to use them.

Aluminum wiring is still commonly used for high power 240v circuits. Main, oven, range, AC, etc. My EVSE was installed with a new 6/3 aluminum 50A circuit.

Based on what I was able to dig up, it is the single conductor Al wiring in branch circuits that is problematic. Twisted high-current wires are much safer. In fact, thick whole-home feed cables are typically aluminum even these days.

 

[planet4ever]

As for the EVSE tax credit, double check you can claim it. If you pay AMT there is a good chance you cannot.

My tax liability for the last several years has exceeded the $7500 Federal credit for EVs, so I should not have any issues with this credit. I leased and did not buy so I don't expect running into AMT issues.

The EVSE credit is more complicated than the $7500 credit for EVs. I don't see how leasing can have anything to do with AMT which usually kicks in if you are in a higher tax bracket or in some other situations, such as exercising but not selling ISO stock options.

Actually, it has everything to do with leasing, or more specifically whether you have other large tax credits. If you lease you don't claim the $7,500 tax credit yourself, and (barring other large credits) most people, including RonDawg, should have no trouble getting the EVSE credit. If you purchase you will almost certainly run afoul of this whether you normally pay AMT or not. The catch is that the EVSE credit forces calculation of AMT, and you can only claim the credit if AMT before credits is less than the standard calculation after credits.

I'm not sure the tax credit for installing a charging station will again be renewed for 2014, plus I found out my municipality has a $200 rebate for installing an L2 EVSE.

My guess is slim-to-no chance the credit will exist in 2014. It actually expired at the end of 2011 and was temporarily reinstated for 2012 and 2013 as part of the "Fiscal Cliff" deal.

Ray

 

[Valdemar]

Actually, it has everything to do with leasing, or more specifically whether you have other large tax credits.

I likely misunderstood, the way RonDawg phrased it made me think that he said leasing would help him to avoid paying AMT.

 

[RonDawg]

Al wire is never run through a conduit, it is NM (aka Romex) cable that runs directly in the walls.

Even in commercial applications? Where I first heard about problems with Al wiring was some news report from the 1970s, and they specifically spoke about the former World Trade Center towers. They were showing how all the switches and outlets had to be retrofitted with pigtails (I guess Cu/Al stuff had not yet been introduced) using that paste you mentioned. I would think something that large would require some sort of conduit.

You'd be more likely to see conduit in commercial locations than residential, but I think it's the Cty of Chicago that requires conduit for even residential, according to an old Bob Vila episode I saw.

 

[Valdemar]

Not sure about commercial. I guess high capacity twisted al wires can be put in a conduit. All residential branch wiring that was done with aluminum used the romex type cable that is not run in a conduit typically. There could be exceptions but my guess they would be very rare.

 

[cdherman]

One problem with Al wire that many electricians don't even know how to work with it. With partial pigtailing you need to be really careful, as some outlets can be daisy-chained, and a circuit failure does not necessarily happen in the one where the heavy load is plugged in. Even if all outlets were pigtailed, can one be absolutely sure some moron didn't create a splice and covered it with drywall previously?

AlumiConn connectors are pretty big, and if a box is pretty full already it may be impossible to use them.

My 1960's era home had aluminum wiring. One morning, I was in the bathroom and I noticed that the compact florescent bulb was flickering a little. I walked into the kitchen and announced to my wife that we got another bad CFL, as "the one in the bathroom is already going out". A few minutes later, she announced to me that "there must be some bugs in the wall" in the livingroom, at which point I realized what was happening. The wires were sizzling in that wall.

I researched how to remedy the situation -- even the special connectors and pigtailing is not a perfect solution. Those connectors, while UL listed, have failed. There is or was a write up about it on the CPSC. At the end of the day, since we had quite a lot of renovations planned anyhow, we replaced ALL the circuits in a 3300 sq ft two story home. It was spread over4 years, but I am much more at peace now.

I have no idea how much it cost... I did a lot of the work myself....

 

[Valdemar]

One problem with Al wire that many electricians don't even know how to work with it. With partial pigtailing you need to be really careful, as some outlets can be daisy-chained, and a circuit failure does not necessarily happen in the one where the heavy load is plugged in. Even if all outlets were pigtailed, can one be absolutely sure some moron didn't create a splice and covered it with drywall previously?

AlumiConn connectors are pretty big, and if a box is pretty full already it may be impossible to use them.

My 1960's era home had aluminum wiring. One morning, I was in the bathroom and I noticed that the compact florescent bulb was flickering a little. I walked into the kitchen and announced to my wife that we got another bad CFL, as "the one in the bathroom is already going out". A few minutes later, she announced to me that "there must be some bugs in the wall" in the livingroom, at which point I realized what was happening. The wires were sizzling in that wall.

I researched how to remedy the situation -- even the special connectors and pigtailing is not a perfect solution. Those connectors, while UL listed, have failed. There is or was a write up about it on the CPSC. At the end of the day, since we had quite a lot of renovations planned anyhow, we replaced ALL the circuits in a 3300 sq ft two story home. It was spread over4 years, but I am much more at peace now.

I have no idea how much it cost... I did a lot of the work myself....

The Copalum crimping and Alumiconn are said to be pretty safe and both are recommended by CPSC, the difficulty is in tracking all connections where they need to be installed. The Ideal 65 connector, a.k.a. the "purple" nut, is known to have issues.

 

[cdherman]

The Copalum cannot be used by DIY folks. I looked just now at the AlumiConn -- it was not on the market when I started the process 7 years ago. Looks like it could be an option.

If I personally went with that route, I would also load test each circuit and see what the drop in voltage was. Unless the wire was known to run a long way from the Main, I would start thinking about replacing any Al circuit with more than 2% drop, even though that would be acceptable in a Cu setup. You just don't know what's happening in the walls.....

 

[Valdemar]

The Copalum cannot be used by DIY folks. I looked just now at the AlumiConn -- it was not on the market when I started the process 7 years ago. Looks like it could be an option.

If I personally went with that route, I would also load test each circuit and see what the drop in voltage was. Unless the wire was known to run a long way from the Main, I would start thinking about replacing any Al circuit with more than 2% drop, even though that would be acceptable in a Cu setup. You just don't know what's happening in the walls.....

Just curious, did you have a bad splicing in the wall that got fried? Aluminum is a good conductor, it is the connections that are problematic. Invisible splicing in the walls are against the code, which is not to say they do not exist

 

[cdherman]

Just curious, did you have a bad splicing in the wall that got fried? Aluminum is a good conductor, it is the connections that are problematic. Invisible splicing in the walls are against the code, which is not to say they do not exist

It was above a box, with the push in connectors into a receptacle. The short was in the receptacle -- it was heating the wires up and popping and crackling. I *think* it would have at some point melted the insulation completely and hopefully shorted the neutral to hot and threw the breaker. But it could have potentially created enough heat to start the stud on fire in the wall.

 

[Valdemar]

Just curious, did you have a bad splicing in the wall that got fried? Aluminum is a good conductor, it is the connections that are problematic. Invisible splicing in the walls are against the code, which is not to say they do not exist

It was above a box, with the push in connectors into a receptacle. The short was in the receptacle -- it was heating the wires up and popping and crackling. I *think* it would have at some point melted the insulation completely and hopefully shorted the neutral to hot and threw the breaker. But it could have potentially created enough heat to start the stud on fire in the wall.

Yeah, pretty much every article I read says aluminum wire should never be used with the push-in type connectors. Good you were around and recognized what was happening.