Multi strand aluminum ground wire

Sorry Bryce , but if you had read the whole conversation you would have seen that the discussion was not about whether aluminum is allowed.

The title of the thread was “Multi strand aluminum ground wire” indicating perhaps you as the original poster were concerned about the metal type. If that’s not a concern, then no worries, sorry for intruding. Concern about aluminum feeders seems pretty common among some inspectors and many Realtors, though they’re fine.

Jim is very knowledgeable:

Don’t thank me to early. Lots of poorly wired circuits terminations in the panel.

I’m jumpin’ in. Why not?
The important to remember is that as home inspectors we are generalists, not experts. Unless you are a licensed electrician you don’t need and I wouldn’t advise getting too deep into diagnosis. Reason? Let’s say you are very specific about an issue in a panel in your report, an electrician comes out a addresses that certain problem and does not evaluate any other conditions in the panel (and there were others), and the house burns down, or someone gets injured. YOU are on the hook.
Remember: Any defects or deficiencies in a panel are a POTENTIAL SAFETY HAZARD, so any issue should be referred to a licensed electrician. “Observed defects and deficiencies in main electrical panel. Recommend further evaluation and necessary correction by a licensed electrician.”

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Great advice.

You mean you don’t write your report so the electrician has less work? You do know they need very explicit instructions to do their job. :wink: (Sarcasm really does not work well with the written word.)

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If you cannot state what these defects and deficiencies are, you are either making things up and or are not sure if they are in fact a defect and out of the norm. If you are not sure, do not label them as a defect. Not being sure, or when something may require invasive inspection, or testing for example, is the only time deferring is an appropriate action. If you cannot inspect an open electrical panel visual for visually identifiable defects, then you should not be taking people’s money to inspect a house they are about to close on. A home inspector is paid to know close to the level of an electrician when it comes to electrical systems of a residential dwelling. How else would you know if something was done correctly or not? you wouldn’t. If you do not understand this, you are just scamming clients by pretending to know things you do not. Be honest with yourself and others. Study hard and be knowledge, don’t take people’s money and defer half, or worse entire, inspection to so called experts – yes, I’ve seen reports that do just that. Hopefully you don’t. A word will get out quickly that you just want your clients to hire all the experts. Good luck :slight_smile:

I can understand what John is saying, if you say nothing about specific defects you cannot be wrong, however I agree with Simon. If I was paying for a report and the electrical panel section said “Observed defects and deficiencies in main electrical panel. Recommend further evaluation and necessary correction by a licensed electrician” I would want my money back. The panel evaluation is part of the SOP for a home inspection and the specific defects should be reported if there are any.

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Thanks for all the advice. Now lighten up and move on.

Robert and Simon, I value your experience and expertise. Money back, though? Try this on for size.
“Any defects that exist in this sub-panel are listed in this report. Recommend correction by a licensed electrician but make certain to limit the electrician to only items listed in this report… Anything else such an electrician might find is BS and should be ignored as I have fully evaluated your panel and other than what I have specifically called out there are NO defects.”

Simon,
I value your experience and expertise. It’s obvious that you have a ton more expertise and experience than most guys on this forum and that includes me for sure! In this business, so saturated with litigation I believe it’s critically important to know what you don’t know. I see smart inspectors post panels on this forum all the time listing a defect or two and then Robert and some of the other guys start listing defect after defect that were not addressed. This is great and I value the input and try my best to learn from it, but it indicates all too clearly the difference between an expert and a generalist. Imagine a HI writing up a panel this way:

“Any defects that exist in this sub-panel are listed in this report. Recommend correction by a licensed electrician. Make certain to limit the electrician to only those items listed in this report… Any other “defect” such an electrician might find is BS and should be ignored as I have fully evaluated your panel and other than what I have specifically called out there are NO other defects.”

Of course this is meant to be humorous, but from a litigant’s point of view this appears to be what you are suggesting. I don’t relish the idea of sitting before a judge and claiming that my knowledge of electrical panels is ‘close to that of an electrician’. The plaintiffs lawyer would have my lunch. "Close to, hmmm close to. How close? Is there a license recognized by the County and the State that recognizes and defines what ‘Close to’ means?

Nope. Call out a defect or two as examples of what’s wrong with the panel and recommend further evaluation by an expert.

We all make mistakes, John…be careful with all encompassing statements. One could find themselves on the short end of the stick.

Best to you.

Oh, humor…never mind then. :smiley:

I remember a previous post from someone who was asked to pay to correct additional defects that the electrician found. I think the advice by one of the experienced contributors was that we should list the defects that we saw, and then to add the words “there may be additional defects“. And then to recommend further evaluation and repair by the electrician. I think that is the best compromise.

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This rings so true. Bad follows bad. Where something big and obvious is missed, often there’s a slew of other problems just down the pike. We’re ultimately flagging an area that needs a detailed professional evaluation.

For that very reason I have that type of wording not only in narratives but also the following, in bold, in the introduction.

The nature and scope of a home inspection is non-invasive, and as such it is possible that a contractor (certified or licensed when required, or otherwise qualified) may discover additional problems. The description of any system, component, or item listed as having a deficiency in this report should not be assumed as complete or exhaustive.

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