Hidden J Box in Attic - ECN Electrical Forums

Quote

Customer lost most of the power on the second floor. Customer had covered the rafters in the attic with 3/4" particle board. Circa 1920's house.

House had been wired in stages - knob & tube, later grey fabric romex (no ground), still later white romex with small ground. Tracer went crazy trying to trace which 4x8 sheet to lift up - finally found this jbox (5 others found - buried under pink stuff and cellulose) - under 7th sheet - fortunately they were all screwed down!

I was taught to twist wires together, making them mechanically sound, and regard the wire nut as a secured insulator - it appeared that these wires were just stuffed in and twisted.......

New run to basement panel.

Grov

An excellent picture.
Looks as if there was plenty of heating that could have very well resulted in a fire. The metal box did well in containing any arcing and heat. But knowing that it wasn't grounded there was no way that a breaker would have been tripped unless there was a massive line to line fault.

Whats that loose screw doing in there?

Don't know about the loose screw - that's the way I found it....... box was held in place with 2 sheetrock screws - obviously postdated the fabric romex.
wonder when sheetrock screws came into play?