Only Hire Qualified Electrical Contractors and Electricians

As you may see from the photo, we are dealing with a commercial building with a flat roof. Typically, a commercial building with a flat roof will use commercial rooftop units. I can only imagine that this might be a small strip mall full of small shops or stores, small stores for the normal commercial unit. Looking at this photo, it does not appear that either a qualified electrical contractor or qualified electricians, or a qualified HVAC technician was ever used on this job.

As you can see, most of the units look old, rusty, and ill maintained. The A/C unit on the right has a 5 gallon plastic bucket holding up a disconnect, that’s not installed professionally per code, certainly it isn’t secured. I have to wonder about a hundred other potential violation like proper wire size, grounding size and connections, proper fuse size, the type of wire used, bushings used, tightness of fittings insuring a good bond,… Also, the 6″x6″ or 8’x8″ wire trough in the front is missing the covers, I don’t even see them laying on the deck.

Did you notice the conduit on the left side and in front of the trough? What a nightmare, apparently no one on this jobs worries about the NEC, National Electrical Code here. The conduit behind the trough running away from the trough also appears to just be left laying on the deck instead of being properly secured to deck boards but it is possible something is there, just not visible on the photo.

Is the wiring water resistant wiring? Are the connections inside the trough water resistant? The trough also looks bent in the middle, clearly very poor maintenance here and I would have to question the qualification of the mechanics and tradesmen on this job. I also have to wonder if the owner is aware of the problem on the roof and of this is typical of the work inside the building. If it is, you have a lot of unsafe condition endangering people and increasing the fire and electrical risk to people and buildings.

When a person hires a contractor, they should not have to worry about the ability to do a job correctly and safely. Always hire qualified tradesmen to do your installations. If the work doesn’t look professionally installed, it probably wasn’t. New installations usually require a permit and inspection if you’re in the city, if you live in the stick, that may not exist.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 1st, 2011 at 9:22 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a comment. Pinging is currently not allowed.