DIRECTV being sued for house fire!
- Thread starter skysurfer
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Can't see that standing up in court unless they get a really ignorant judge who knows NOTHING about electronics. Unless something was wrong with the houses electrical system to start with, a receiver is not going to overload a circuit all by itself. Unless the customer has a hundred other things running on that same circuit, in which case, one could argue that it was a matter of time before the house burned down anyways.
Not knowing all the details of what happened, I find it difficult to believe the installer is at fault for plugging a satellite receiver into an a/c receptacle. I doubt if the installer did any high-voltage work. Sounds like another frivolous lawsuit to me.
Now that's even more suspect because an alarm system is low-voltage and the only power it gets is from a 13-16.5v transformer plugged into an outlet.
first let me say I am an electrician, and satellite tech. Second I do not know all the facts of the case, so all this is theory
The first thing that bothers me is anyone that keeps reseting a breaker that trips they trip for a reason in this case I'm guessing a short, on a general lighting circuit I doubt that an IRD would trip since they use Milliamps of electricity, though it is possible that the box had internal problems. This could have been easily troubleshooted by simply unplugging the box, and testing the circuit. We don't know if he did that because the article doesn't tell us that.
It is possible that he knicked, or drilled through a wire since fires are caused by arcing then this fits what we know. It is possible that it could have ignited the truses, or insulation in the attic. This is all assuming he knicked a wire.
It is possible that had had issues there before, Did the installer even go in the attic? Again we don't know. He could have stepped on a wire that was stapled too tight, and the romex shorted. At this point it is a grey area that could put the inspector, and the electrician liable. Unless it is over 5 years, which puts it on the homeowner, or maybe the installer lol!
As far as the transformer, it sure can cause a fire. I doesn't matter if it is low voltage transformers of any kind give off heat, and if the connections are loose they will arc, and can set insulation ect on fire.
We don't have very much info, just what the homeowner, and insurance company said. Just my 2 cents
The first thing that bothers me is anyone that keeps reseting a breaker that trips they trip for a reason in this case I'm guessing a short, on a general lighting circuit I doubt that an IRD would trip since they use Milliamps of electricity, though it is possible that the box had internal problems. This could have been easily troubleshooted by simply unplugging the box, and testing the circuit. We don't know if he did that because the article doesn't tell us that.
It is possible that he knicked, or drilled through a wire since fires are caused by arcing then this fits what we know. It is possible that it could have ignited the truses, or insulation in the attic. This is all assuming he knicked a wire.
It is possible that had had issues there before, Did the installer even go in the attic? Again we don't know. He could have stepped on a wire that was stapled too tight, and the romex shorted. At this point it is a grey area that could put the inspector, and the electrician liable. Unless it is over 5 years, which puts it on the homeowner, or maybe the installer lol!
As far as the transformer, it sure can cause a fire. I doesn't matter if it is low voltage transformers of any kind give off heat, and if the connections are loose they will arc, and can set insulation ect on fire.
We don't have very much info, just what the homeowner, and insurance company said. Just my 2 cents
I feel installer at fault
The clues and reasons are I feel obvious. The installer left after 15 minutes of his set-up not working. Also after repeating blown circuit breakers he should have known something was wrong and told the homeowner to call a electrician before he would hook up.
Not related but having the plug not all the way in socket would be and is cause of many fires. And I am a retired electrician.
The clues and reasons are I feel obvious. The installer left after 15 minutes of his set-up not working. Also after repeating blown circuit breakers he should have known something was wrong and told the homeowner to call a electrician before he would hook up.
Not related but having the plug not all the way in socket would be and is cause of many fires. And I am a retired electrician.
I have actually seen this happen with a friend of mine who owned a hardware store. They just had an alarm system installed where a technician installed a 25 AMP transformer when the specs called for a 5 AMP Transformer.
The technician used smaller wire than what was required with the 25 AMP transformer and the wire heated up and caught on fire.
With all the paint and other items, the store went up pretty quick!
The only way the installer can be held responcible is if it can be proven he drilled through a wire and then tried to cover it up by resetting the breaker as if nothing happened.
If the installer plugged something in and the breaker tripped, then he would not be held responcible.
With that said, im really tired of customers giving blame to the last person who touched a paticular system. For example, I get a customer calling me crying that their system does not work and begs me to come out to do a service call for them. I don't really have time to do the service call because I got better things to do, so I tell them to go call the origional people who installed their system and make it their problem.
Ofcourse the customer can't get ahold of the origional company, so they agree to pay me to come out and fix their system.
I do my Job, get the system up and running and go on my way.
A month later I get a call from the same customer but with now a different problem, and they expect me to come out for FREE since I was the last person who worked on their system.
End result is me going out on one of these service calls and spending twice the amount of time I should have spent out there to fix the system so I don't get any call backs! Its not right!
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