ECN Forum
Posted By: electure Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 01:04 PM
Quote
Ah, how I love getting a service call with a description "We had a water pipe leak and heard some noises and lost power to our exercise room". Sounds like a long night's work coming...

In a 14 story apartment building in Alexandria, VA we found this GE panel (which had seen better days by the time we showed up)on the first floor which had suffered a water leak directly above. The pics are pretty self descriptive, but here is the back story.

Maintenance guys from the building showed up when a tenant discovered water on the floor and noise coming from a nearby electrical panel and made a call. Luckily (for the maintenance guy) the fault had blown the fuses in the distribution bucket in the basement so when they opened the panel nothing was hot. If the fuses had not gone this could have been pretty bad for the first one to take a look at the problem. The panel has been replaced and the water line relocated, and for me it is a good reminder of why we need to follow code (and common sense) when doing installations.

Pete Brogan


[Linked Image]


[Linked Image]


[Linked Image]


[Linked Image]
Posted By: Dnkldorf Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 01:17 PM
$$$$Cha-Ching$$$$


Dnk..
Posted By: sandro2 Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 01:35 PM
All that damage doesn't look recent. It looks like its been leaking for quite a while.
Posted By: Rewired Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 03:55 PM
Looks like one of them old school "liquid cooled" panels [Linked Image]

Seriously though that looks like quite the cooker that one... Amazing what a little water and some dirt can do to electrical equipment...
Maybe its a good thing that panel there has gotten the "eviction notice"... I never really thought those OLD G.E breakers were too good anyway, they seemed "weak" and always seemed to get hot and trip for no reason...

A.D
Posted By: RODALCO Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 06:15 PM
Good piccies mate,
Drip, drip, drip, gush, gush, more water, corrosion, arcs, hissing, B A N G ! !
It looks that the water has leaked here for a while.
Posted By: ShockMe77 Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/19/06 08:12 PM
It's some how rewarding to know that I'm not the only one who gets to do work like this!
Posted By: BKey Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/20/06 02:08 PM
In Pic #3 was the lug on the left cracked? It appears to be.
Posted By: Lostazhell Re: Apartment Water Leak - 02/21/06 04:30 AM
Kinda funny.... The last GE panel (THQP, not quite as old as the one above) I changed was in an apartment, which suffered water damage from the kids upstairs overfilling the bathtub.... [Linked Image]
© ECN Electrical Forums