New apartment electrical woows...

OK I got an update for you guys.

I called the number I was given for the DoB and they told me that i needed to call 311 and file a complaint. I did so, and they marked it as urgent because of the possible fire hazard on the new breaker - PS My dad used to be an electrician and he said that they had a 14 awg wire for the new 20 amp breaker just as i suspected.

The inspector was out in less than a week (which was yesterday) He said that the whole place has negative polarize output and that it is bad for my computers - is this still bad if they are going through a UPS? - I also had a hard drive recently go haywire on me, could it be from the power?

Anyway, The whole place is underwired - not grandfathered in and my room that has no outlets is required to have one on each wall.

When the inspector went into the basement to check the breakers he fell in a hole and got pissed and said, hes now pissed and is writing my landlord every violation he deserves! haha.

Anyway, we are supose to call his supervisor and explain that we have ferrets and if the power goes out on a hot day they can die to push getting a court date soon. I wrote my landlord a letter though, explaining that i went to the city because I already tried working it out with him and he insulted my intelligence by putting that 20 amp breaker in there. The city is eventually going to make him fix the wiring now because of the violations so I asked him nicely if he could just come through and actually *Fix* the problem of his own accord.

H>

Reply to
digitsix
Loading thread data ...

| The inspector was out in less than a week (which was yesterday) He | said that the whole place has negative polarize output and that it is | bad for my computers - is this still bad if they are going through a | UPS? - I also had a hard drive recently go haywire on me, could it be | from the power?

That depends. If everything is plugged in through the same outlet and everything is using either grounded plugs properly wired (and assuming the ground hole is properly wired) or is transformer isolated, it should be OK. The problem is that you could see voltages develop between the computer case, or the shield wire of connetions, and other things being connected (such as phone or cable lines). If your UPS is fully transformer isolated, you're safe. A UPS that does full time conversion (always converts AC to DC, works with the battery, and converts DC back to AC) would be sufficiently isolated.

| Anyway, The whole place is underwired - not grandfathered in and my | room that has no outlets is required to have one on each wall.

It sounded like your landlord was a big cheapskate, including hiring unqualified or corrupt (this is Chicago) electricians.

| Anyway, we are supose to call his supervisor and explain that we have | ferrets and if the power goes out on a hot day they can die to push | getting a court date soon. I wrote my landlord a letter though, | explaining that i went to the city because I already tried working it | out with him and he insulted my intelligence by putting that 20 amp | breaker in there. The city is eventually going to make him fix the | wiring now because of the violations so I asked him nicely if he could | just come through and actually *Fix* the problem of his own accord. | | Hopefully he complies and if he doesnt I can use these pending | violations to break my lease and find a new apartment.

Be sure you don't do anything that can give _him_ an excuse to break the lease. You want to be the one in control here, so be sure you don't violate any of the rules, and that your rent is paid in full on time during all this. Still, he might have cause to "throw you out" simply because "the building is not habitable" (perhaps during re-construction work). You might want to be looking around for another apartment, anyway. Good luck.

Reply to
phil-news-nospam

PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.