First, a disclaimer: I have never been what one would call "handy." Hammers and I mix well, not so much saws and power tools.
But it looked like such a simple project.
It all started a couple of weeks ago with a ceiling light that went out on our second floor. Replacing the light bulbs didn't fix it, so my guess is the transformer went kaput. Then the light in our front hall went out. Again, new light bulb, no fix. So these lights are two of four pretty much identical ones that had been installed by the previous owner of our condo. So I figure I'll just replace all four.
Now, the guy we bought from fancied himself a do-it-yourselfer. He did the condo conversion himself (our condo is in what used to be a single family house), and did a lot of work on our unit before putting it on the market. We've been here 3 years, and it's becoming ever more evident that he didn't do a particularly good job. In fact, he half-assed just about everything he touched, but in ways that wouldn't raise red flags with a house inspector.
So, back to the lights.
This past weekend I went ahead and got 4 ceiling lights. I start with the front hall. Take off the glass, start unscrewing, and realize that I'm faced with another example of our previous owners handiwork. Once I take down the light, all I see is a couple of holes in the ceiling and a wire...no outlet box, not even a proper hole for an outlet box. The guy had just screwed the base of the light directly into the ceiling rafters, punched a hole in the ceiling, and threaded the wires through.
Okay, so I can't get the light back on now ('cause I can't see what precisely the screws are supposed to screw into), so I set the old light aside, make a mental note to call an electrician, and start on the light in the stairs...which isn't kaput, but is one of the four I want to swap out. I take off the glass, and same deal, only this time he just screwed the base of the light into the ceiling with a bunch of wood screws. Alright, I'm not touching this....time to put the glass cover back on and head upstairs.
Luckily, things are looking a little bit more up to code upstairs. I swap the lights out no problem, and all the parts that should be there in the ceiling are actually there. But the outlet boxes feel kinda loose. So I'm still going to call an electrician, this time to check every ceiling light in the house
The take-home message, gentle readers, is this: If you're going to do some home "improvements," do it right. If you can't, find a professional who can. Because half-assing it can be a real pain for the next person.
DIY house projects are one thing. DIY particle physics is something else entirely. The Journal of Instrumentation recently made available nearly full plans for the Large Hadron Collider -- a gigantic particle-smashing accelerator that will soon go online in Europe and which some people fear might be powerful enough to create miniature, Earth-annihilating black holes -- allowing anyone with "€6 billion, enough real estate to hold your 17-mile-long ring, [and] a staff of international geniuses" to build their very own 7 TeV accelerator. I suspect you might need some additional electrical work, too.
Posts
