I ran into this kind of overfusing situation a few years back while visiting an aunt(well into her 80's) in North Carolina. She lived in a c.1920's two story house with K & T wiring and one of those "main + range + 4" fuse panels which were/are so prevalent. She had just installed three new window air conditioners upstairs, then began having problems blowing out fuses (one fuse for the entire second floor). While visitng, and on the first of many trips to the fuse box while I was there, I noticed that all the plug fuses were 30's (big surprise...). Examining the inside of the box, as well as the visible wiring in the attic, revealed No. 12, and in a few cases, No. 14 awg conductors, most of which were in pretty dicey condition. After explaining to her that she and her house were both living off borrowed time like this, she needed to use smaller fuses until she hired an electrician to do a complete rewiring for her. She became extremely angered by the fact that I replaced the oversized fuses with 15's, explaining to me in no uncertain terms that "the 30's don't blow out anywhere near as fast as the smaller ones, plus they all cost the same and you're just wasting your money". [Linked Image]

If you're looking for a weak link here, I would dare to say that it's her appalling lack of education (not that I hadn't tried many times since that visit to set her straight). If there's an up-side to all this, I guess it would be that she finally had the house rewired recently - thanks to a weak splice that finally burned in two and rendered most of the upstairs without power (and without a resulting fire, thank God).

Mike (mamills)

BTW; the electrician removed the box intact and my aunt sent it to me, so I ended up with a nice "new" fuse box for my collection! [Linked Image]




[This message has been edited by mamills (edited 09-18-2002).]