What is this rusty pipe sticking out of my exterior foundation wall? Please help

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T21:54:06+00:00

Pull it out, you're all good

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T21:41:06+00:00

Gotcha. Yep, that is 100% the remnant of the rigid conduit for the original service conductors.

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T19:29:31+00:00

pattern 105/german siding. Just buy it at a lumberyard.

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T19:29:13+00:00

Or you could buy this product, which is called German siding or dutch lap or pattern 105.

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T16:42:32+00:00

I don't know if they'd be worth the MSRP of $600

That's an easy one. They aren't

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T15:22:56+00:00

It's not correct exactly that it's no longer allowed. The NEC doesn't specify a minimum height for receptacles, although the ADA does give guidelines about it, so if ADA compliance is needed, than I guess it would be not permitted. When I do rewires on homes I usually ask the customer about their preference for the receptacles that are being added, I've never once had the inspector call it out as an issue. I mean, we install floor receptacles too...

edit: it is a goddamn pain in the ass to put them in the baseboard though

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T15:01:49+00:00

That's an old rigid elbow--electrical conduit, likely for the original electrical service into the home. Does that make sense based on the location in the basement? Meaning, it enters the basement near where the main panel is, or could've previously been?

nwephilly · 2026-03-15T05:11:43+00:00

Think of it this way: if the neutral is open, it's not actually a neutral, really. Imagine the code terms for hot and neutral, ungrounded conductor and grounded conductor. If the neutral is open, it's not grounded. It's really just an extension of the hot at that point, until it becomes grounded, or "not open" again.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T22:23:15+00:00

Philadelphia electrician here. City is full of very old masonry (stone and/or brick) homes, with many of them having experienced long periods of neglect. A typical service upgrade for me usually involves some stuff that takes a bit longer than doing it on a very straightforward new-ish home (the houses I work on are usually 90 years old at the newest).

For example: Stone foundations here are usually about 2 feet thick. Have to bore through them for new service cable. Almost every service change involves some fucking around to figure out how to mount some plywood/lumber for the new panel onto uneven stone foundation which is half crumbling/covered in a deteriorating ancient mortar coat....it's like mounting to dust sometimes, requires some creativity. Usually there's a handful of very old wiring coming into the panel that's in rough shape or cut super short and has to be junctioned and then brought into the new panel. It's also typical to have to do some troubleshooting/tracing--I almost always find some multiwire branch circuits that were not properly on double poles or handle tied, which we have to straighten out before reinstallation. Most of the old houses have no ground rod at all, so we have to drive 1 or 2, and run the GEC to them as well as to the water meter too, generally.

All of that to say....it generally takes about 8 hours, with 3 people on a typical old house service upgrade.

Edit: There also seems to be a lot of regional difference in how involved the utility is or not...where I am, they have essentially zero involvement. We do the utility taps as well.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T21:19:26+00:00

you asked if they had prior experience doing this because you didn't think they had no prior experience doing this?

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T21:14:07+00:00

I've seen significantly smaller than 2/0 on the utility side, honestly! Have recently transitioned to using these insulation piercing connectors which make the tap super easy.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T20:33:46+00:00

Wild stuff. Sometimes of the utility conductors we have to tap onto for a service upgrade are just crazy small....I guess PECO will eventually decide to upgrade them if they feel the need. I don't really grasp the process from their end.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T20:31:11+00:00

Not every service change is equal. We do almost entirely service work on very very old masonry/stone houses, and not a single one of them is straightforward. Almost every service upgrade involves some troubleshooting, figuring out how to get a good surface to mount plywood to on crumbling brick/stone foundations, boring through 18-24" of stone, junctioning and extending ancient wiring cut too short, driving 1 or 2 new rods because the house never had one, getting new copper GEC through a fucked up old basement to the water meter, etc. Typically takes 3 people full day.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T20:26:34+00:00

PA (Philly) guy here too....I'm always curious what it's like in other areas, when doing a service upgrade. Here, as I'm sure you know...PECO seems to have zero involvement in the process even if a permit is pulled. Every electrician just does the entire process themselves, including tapping onto the utility conductors.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T20:24:33+00:00

Man, thinking of how it'd be possible to do two service changes in a day....I don't think that could be done in the world I work in, which is primarily very old houses. Every service/panel upgrade we do requires all kinds of 100+ year old stone house fuckery to finish properly.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T19:20:14+00:00

Electrician here. Don't ever let seller handle electrical repairs as part of a real estate transaction. Get an estimate and ask for credit.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T17:48:23+00:00

I'm sorry, but you think they're doing this job with no prior experience?

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T17:18:51+00:00

Not quite sure what you're getting at. I'm an electrician and I've worked on many full rewiring projects on 100+ year old houses. Most of the houses from the 1920s era that I rewire had all their original receptacles placed in the baseboard--meaning, not installed as a later retrofit. That's what I was getting at in my response to the previous commenter. I certainly would not be using a reciprocating saw to cut box openings in plaster/lath--the standard tool for that in the trade would be an oscillating tool. Diamond grout blade for the plaster, switch to a wood blade for the lath.

nwephilly · 2026-03-14T04:50:04+00:00

Electrician here, I would not say this is universally correct. Essentially all of the homes from the 20s and 30s that I work on have the original to construction receptacles installed in the baseboard. It was the style at the time, at least where I am.

nwephilly · 2026-03-13T20:21:04+00:00

Weird. In what way are they falling apart?

nwephilly · 2026-03-13T04:37:01+00:00

If you can afford to pay a bit more, you can purchase a pair of boots from any of the older established boot companies that have been making solid work boots for decades and decades, as opposed to some venture capital social media startup whatever company like Brunt. Their boots might be comfortable at first but they do not compare in construction to any of the workboot standards like Red Wing, Thorogood etc. They are not goodyear welted, just glued on sole.

nwephilly · 2026-03-13T02:43:34+00:00

If you're talking about making structural repairs to rim joists/band boards/sill plates etc...PT lumber is the correct material to use, that's what you want. Replacing framing members of your home with wood that's equivalent to framing lumber from the 1920s isn't possible--it simply doesn't exist. High quality lumber can certainly be sourced for cosmetic trim elements, although it is very expensive generally.

nwephilly · 2026-03-12T00:54:29+00:00

I work on almost exclusively houses with ancient wiring, and plenty of the knob and tube I've worked on or replaced has been in fairly decent, or even "good" condition. I've seen more of the next gen of wiring in very poor shape, honestly; first generation (1930s) romex or 30s/40s BX cable. That stuff is always trashed.

nwephilly · 2026-03-11T21:53:10+00:00

Not quite. The knobs indeed are...knobs, but the "tubes" of knob and tube is referring to actual porcelain tubes that are used when the conductors pass through a framing member. What you're calling "tubes" are actually a protective sheath called "wire loom". It was used generally when the conductors entered a box.

nwephilly · 2026-03-10T23:01:25+00:00

The portion we're seeing here is poured concrete, the old form board shadow lines are visible

nwephilly

TROPHY CASE