Hand-painted ceilings and crispy wires
The ceilings in our front rooms were one of the top selling features in our house when we first looked at it. They're honestly one-of-a-kind. We figured, given the semi-modern globe light fixtures, that we could trust their installation in this gorgeous room. But $300 later, I GUESS NOT. We should never assume anything about this house ever...
I'll start with the After picture, because it's much more satisfying to discuss. I've been wanting to make this change for over a year.
Aren't they beautiful? I knew as soon as I saw these ceilings that lights like these would be perfect in this room. My vision has finally been fulfilled! Here are links to the fixtures and light bulbs I used. They give off a surprising amount of light, and it gives the room a really cool ambiance.
Since I had previously watched and practiced electrical work on our many electrical nightmares in this house, I figured this couldn't be too hard. To be far, I was right in that sense. I just began my project on the wrong light fixture: the middle one.
After removing the globe light previously in the center of the room, I could already sense a stressful time approaching. First of all, I'm not an electrician of any sort, but why (why??) would someone bypass a perfectly good ground wire, and instead connect a bare copper wire from the hex nut on the light fixture itself to the installation plate? This is already, of course, ignoring the fact that rather than cutting a circle in the ceiling and installing an electrical box, as one should, they just decided to screw the whole thing right into the drywall. And no, these holes do not align with a stud, in case you were wondering.
This presented an immediate problem, as no matter where I tried to install the new hardware for the pendant lights, I met only crumbling drywall. Out of this hole actually came quite a few surprises, one being what I assume to be nearly-100-year-old wiring insulation...? But besides that, I presented my husband with the issue, and we decided that, rather than destroy our beautiful ceilings, we would rather consult with a professional to make sure that we didn't do any further damage.
After calling a 24-hour service, an electrician showed up and took a look himself. After using some power tools to neatly widen the hole, we discovered that, not only would we have to use 4" long screws to reach the nearest stud, but that a good 3-4 inches at the ends of each wire was burned to a crisp. The insulation around each wire was cracking and breaking off, so he clipped the whole end off the long piece, and thankfully there was enough to spare in the ceiling to clip, strip, and splice into the new pendants.
I paid the hefty price for an at-demand electrician, and proceeded to install the others myself. The first gave me no trouble at all, as the drywall there was much more forgiving, and I used our newly-acquired 4" screws to stay on the safe side. I kick myself for not starting on that one, as it was much less terrifying than the first. However, more problems presented with the third.
Thankfully, both the middle and right fixtures had enough wiring to spare in order to clip off the burnt-to-a-crisp wiring protruding from the ceiling. The left side did not. After clipping off the fried ends, this was all I was left with, even after a careful tug to reveal all possible length of the wiring.
As you can see, this hole is also much, much smaller than the first two were, so I didn't think splicing some extra lengths of wire would prove efficient, especially considering the small amount of hiding space available in the heads of the pendant lights. So, I worked with what I had, as stressful as it was. After installing the fixture plate and stripping the insulation to expose the bare wires, I barely had enough to splice into the new ones, but Praise Be, it still worked out.
After this stressful interaction, I definitely plan to steer clear of any bigger electrical projects in the near future. Of course, I'm glad that I learned some valuable lessons regarding the electrical state of our home, as well as the status of our breaker and smoke detectors given to me by the electrician, which will likely be another spendy project. Now I know just how much of a task replacing the fluorescents in our basement might end up being!
I'll start with the After picture, because it's much more satisfying to discuss. I've been wanting to make this change for over a year.
Aren't they beautiful? I knew as soon as I saw these ceilings that lights like these would be perfect in this room. My vision has finally been fulfilled! Here are links to the fixtures and light bulbs I used. They give off a surprising amount of light, and it gives the room a really cool ambiance.
After removing the globe light previously in the center of the room, I could already sense a stressful time approaching. First of all, I'm not an electrician of any sort, but why (why??) would someone bypass a perfectly good ground wire, and instead connect a bare copper wire from the hex nut on the light fixture itself to the installation plate? This is already, of course, ignoring the fact that rather than cutting a circle in the ceiling and installing an electrical box, as one should, they just decided to screw the whole thing right into the drywall. And no, these holes do not align with a stud, in case you were wondering.
This presented an immediate problem, as no matter where I tried to install the new hardware for the pendant lights, I met only crumbling drywall. Out of this hole actually came quite a few surprises, one being what I assume to be nearly-100-year-old wiring insulation...? But besides that, I presented my husband with the issue, and we decided that, rather than destroy our beautiful ceilings, we would rather consult with a professional to make sure that we didn't do any further damage.
After calling a 24-hour service, an electrician showed up and took a look himself. After using some power tools to neatly widen the hole, we discovered that, not only would we have to use 4" long screws to reach the nearest stud, but that a good 3-4 inches at the ends of each wire was burned to a crisp. The insulation around each wire was cracking and breaking off, so he clipped the whole end off the long piece, and thankfully there was enough to spare in the ceiling to clip, strip, and splice into the new pendants.
I paid the hefty price for an at-demand electrician, and proceeded to install the others myself. The first gave me no trouble at all, as the drywall there was much more forgiving, and I used our newly-acquired 4" screws to stay on the safe side. I kick myself for not starting on that one, as it was much less terrifying than the first. However, more problems presented with the third.
Thankfully, both the middle and right fixtures had enough wiring to spare in order to clip off the burnt-to-a-crisp wiring protruding from the ceiling. The left side did not. After clipping off the fried ends, this was all I was left with, even after a careful tug to reveal all possible length of the wiring.
As you can see, this hole is also much, much smaller than the first two were, so I didn't think splicing some extra lengths of wire would prove efficient, especially considering the small amount of hiding space available in the heads of the pendant lights. So, I worked with what I had, as stressful as it was. After installing the fixture plate and stripping the insulation to expose the bare wires, I barely had enough to splice into the new ones, but Praise Be, it still worked out.
After this stressful interaction, I definitely plan to steer clear of any bigger electrical projects in the near future. Of course, I'm glad that I learned some valuable lessons regarding the electrical state of our home, as well as the status of our breaker and smoke detectors given to me by the electrician, which will likely be another spendy project. Now I know just how much of a task replacing the fluorescents in our basement might end up being!
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