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I would not want a house wired by a 60 day electrician, that's for sure. I don't think I'd want a flood done by the 60 day plumber either, but those are the onl

by hobs 2y ago

I would not want a house wired by a 60 day electrician, that's for sure. I don't think I'd want a flood done by the 60 day plumber either, but those are the only two trades I am familiar enough with to be aghast by this comment.

quesera 2y ago
I'm sure that's true. And it means that you do not know how to do electrical or plumbing work. That's fine! But take it from someone who does: it does not take years of training to be excellent at it. Household electric and plumbing is extremely straightforward. Commercial can be much more complicated! And if you run into any semi-complicated stuff, like say a bathroom below grade where you need a toilet to flush uphill ... you learn it from the vast resources available, or you call a plumber for that bit. Simple. Similarly, if you ever are not 100% certain of your own work, you call a licensed tradesman for the inspection. Note that this is not always allowed -- but where it is, everyone agrees that it makes total sense.
- hondo77 2y ago
  Household electric doesn't necessarily take years but it takes longer than 60 days of YouTube videos.
  - quesera 2y ago
    I learned it in a few days of work. You could too. I don't recommend YouTube though! The most complicated thing is knowing the code, which boils down to just a handful of simple rules for residential stuff. Most importantly: look it up, don't guess. There's a right way to do everything, and it's never the hard way. There is very little variance or judgement call involved, the code is quite clear and specific. Doing it right might take additional materials or time though, and that's fine.
    - XorNot 2y ago
      Just want to say the push back you're getting on this topic is one I've experienced everywhere - the actual work of the trades is basically treated as an unknowable black magic which only it's arcane practitioners can do. Which I think is partly held up essentially by the "dodgy tradie" stories which are routinely passed around but get re-interpreted as "it's very easy to do <obvious stupid thing>" when the stupid thing is something like "don't do a wire run from 10 short pieces of wire you have lying around" or "PVC pipes need to be glued together to not leak".
    - ty6853 2y ago
      I built my entire house shell from 3 hours of larry haun on youtube in russian and almost nothing else with no experience. Just watched I then copied everything. The hardest part was getting a hold of a 6 ton backhoe for a day to dig the footings, which I also learned to use by pure experimentation about 15 minutes before I dug my foundation.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    I think 60 days is excessive depending on your prior knowledge. If you understand voltage current and resistance, you can read the electrical code book in a day. Most of it will be irrelevant. Home wiring is almost entirely outlets, junction boxes, and running Romex. You can teach someone to do 95% of it in a day. It's the edge cases that are time consuming to learn. Understanding each case that could come up on different types of builds, in different scenarios, is an important skill to be a proficient electrician that can walk onto a unknown job site, complete it, and leave at the end of the day. It makes sense if you are running commercial job sites where time is money. It makes sense if there is a failure or upgrade needed on an operational structure. If someone is smart and time is less critical, it is only moderately slower to learn the edge cases as they come up. I did the gas, electricity, and plumbing install for my Mom's kitchen, and I did it to the State building code. I did it in one week and with no prior training. In a lot of ways, the certification process for contractors mirrors that of our white collar workers. Someone might spend 4 years getting a computer engineering degree, learn a dozen languages, study English and art, only to code basic tasks in CSS. Even simpler, barbers don't really need a 1000 hours of certified coursework to do a buzz cut, or even your 50 most common haircuts.
    - deleted 2y ago
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potato3732842 2y ago
New construction is stupid simple. Anyone with a pulse can do it. It's like the difference between greenfield dev and surgical bug fixes.
- hondo77 2y ago
  So you haven't done bug fixes on something poorly architected initially because the project was started by anyone with a pulse instead of someone experienced? Same with electrical. Yeah, you can learn the basics but only experience is going to get you to do it right. And two months ain't enough experience to do all the new construction electrical for someone else's house. Doing it for yourself is fine because only you have to deal with what you didn't do completely right when you didn't know any better.
  - quesera 2y ago
    You will sell your house someday, so doing it yourself has more than just personal implications, which is why inspections are required. But you're wrong about the experience required. Everything you do in a house gets done repeatedly. A modicum of code knowledge, a good reference book, some simple math to calculate loads, some skill with power tools, and a lot of patience. No problem. There are zero surprises in a house, the requirements are 100% predictable. Get it inspected, of course, because QA is always beneficial. Be careful, but don't be afraid of it, it's not magical or malevolent.
    - potato3732842 2y ago
      What passes inspection is only a tiny subset of what is "right and fine and will never cause problems". The whole point of codes and inspections is to eliminate thinking and turn the subjective into the qualitative.
      - quesera 2y ago
        I don't know what point you're making here. You can learn to do competent, inspection-passing, code-compliant, and never-problem-causing electrical work, adequate for wiring a full house, in less than a week. From your other comments, I think we agree. Apologies if I've misunderstood your points.

by hobs 2y ago

quesera 2y ago

I'm sure that's true. And it means that you do not know how to do electrical or plumbing work. That's fine! But take it from someone who does: it does not take years of training to be excellent at it. Household electric and plumbing is extremely straightforward. Commercial can be much more complicated! And if you run into any semi-complicated stuff, like say a bathroom below grade where you need a toilet to flush uphill ... you learn it from the vast resources available, or you call a plumber for that bit. Simple. Similarly, if you ever are not 100% certain of your own work, you call a licensed tradesman for the inspection. Note that this is not always allowed -- but where it is, everyone agrees that it makes total sense.

hondo77 2y ago
Household electric doesn't necessarily take years but it takes longer than 60 days of YouTube videos.
- quesera 2y ago
  I learned it in a few days of work. You could too. I don't recommend YouTube though! The most complicated thing is knowing the code, which boils down to just a handful of simple rules for residential stuff. Most importantly: look it up, don't guess. There's a right way to do everything, and it's never the hard way. There is very little variance or judgement call involved, the code is quite clear and specific. Doing it right might take additional materials or time though, and that's fine.
  - XorNot 2y ago
    Just want to say the push back you're getting on this topic is one I've experienced everywhere - the actual work of the trades is basically treated as an unknowable black magic which only it's arcane practitioners can do. Which I think is partly held up essentially by the "dodgy tradie" stories which are routinely passed around but get re-interpreted as "it's very easy to do <obvious stupid thing>" when the stupid thing is something like "don't do a wire run from 10 short pieces of wire you have lying around" or "PVC pipes need to be glued together to not leak".
  - ty6853 2y ago
    I built my entire house shell from 3 hours of larry haun on youtube in russian and almost nothing else with no experience. Just watched I then copied everything. The hardest part was getting a hold of a 6 ton backhoe for a day to dig the footings, which I also learned to use by pure experimentation about 15 minutes before I dug my foundation.
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  I think 60 days is excessive depending on your prior knowledge. If you understand voltage current and resistance, you can read the electrical code book in a day. Most of it will be irrelevant. Home wiring is almost entirely outlets, junction boxes, and running Romex. You can teach someone to do 95% of it in a day. It's the edge cases that are time consuming to learn. Understanding each case that could come up on different types of builds, in different scenarios, is an important skill to be a proficient electrician that can walk onto a unknown job site, complete it, and leave at the end of the day. It makes sense if you are running commercial job sites where time is money. It makes sense if there is a failure or upgrade needed on an operational structure. If someone is smart and time is less critical, it is only moderately slower to learn the edge cases as they come up. I did the gas, electricity, and plumbing install for my Mom's kitchen, and I did it to the State building code. I did it in one week and with no prior training. In a lot of ways, the certification process for contractors mirrors that of our white collar workers. Someone might spend 4 years getting a computer engineering degree, learn a dozen languages, study English and art, only to code basic tasks in CSS. Even simpler, barbers don't really need a 1000 hours of certified coursework to do a buzz cut, or even your 50 most common haircuts.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

potato3732842 2y ago

New construction is stupid simple. Anyone with a pulse can do it. It's like the difference between greenfield dev and surgical bug fixes.

hondo77 2y ago
So you haven't done bug fixes on something poorly architected initially because the project was started by anyone with a pulse instead of someone experienced? Same with electrical. Yeah, you can learn the basics but only experience is going to get you to do it right. And two months ain't enough experience to do all the new construction electrical for someone else's house. Doing it for yourself is fine because only you have to deal with what you didn't do completely right when you didn't know any better.
- quesera 2y ago
  You will sell your house someday, so doing it yourself has more than just personal implications, which is why inspections are required. But you're wrong about the experience required. Everything you do in a house gets done repeatedly. A modicum of code knowledge, a good reference book, some simple math to calculate loads, some skill with power tools, and a lot of patience. No problem. There are zero surprises in a house, the requirements are 100% predictable. Get it inspected, of course, because QA is always beneficial. Be careful, but don't be afraid of it, it's not magical or malevolent.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    What passes inspection is only a tiny subset of what is "right and fine and will never cause problems". The whole point of codes and inspections is to eliminate thinking and turn the subjective into the qualitative.
    - quesera 2y ago
      I don't know what point you're making here. You can learn to do competent, inspection-passing, code-compliant, and never-problem-causing electrical work, adequate for wiring a full house, in less than a week. From your other comments, I think we agree. Apologies if I've misunderstood your points.