Hot take: That "loose neutral" everyone blames is actually a bad connection at the panel 9 times out of 10

I chased a flickering light in a house built in 2019 for an hour yesterday, turned out a neutral wire was barely seated in the breaker bus bar, not loose at the outlet. Has anyone else found this way more common than a bad splice in the wall?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_beth18d ago

Spent 20 minutes at a panel last week realizing the same thing. Felt pretty silly.

the_kai18d ago

Bet half those people on the panel hadn't actually read the thing themselves. Seen it happen way too many times where they just skimmed a summary going in.

joseph_hunt13d ago

Yeah, "felt pretty silly" really hit me because I bet the people on stage didn't even know you were sitting there going through that. I mean, here's the thing I don't see anyone bringing up. Sometimes the person who wrote the actual book isn't even the best person to talk about it, you know? Like they're too close to it and can't explain it in simple terms for a room full of people. But then you end up with a panel where nobody's read the book and nobody wrote it either, just a bunch of people who know someone who knows someone. It's like a game of telephone but nobody remembers they're playing.