Electrical Work in Worthington, OH

When it comes to wiring, Worthington is two towns in one. Old Worthington, the historic village core, has houses from the 1800s that got electricity long after they were built. Around it spread the ranches and split-levels of the 1950s through the 1970s, wired for their time and now carrying far more than that.

The 1800s Houses of Old Worthington

Electricity came to these houses as an addition, and many have been updated in stages since. One house can hold several eras of wiring: knob-and-tube in the attic, cloth-covered cable in a wall, modern cable in the kitchen, sometimes joined by splices with no box around them. Some still run on a fuse box, where a blown 15-amp fuse is too easily replaced with a 30-amp one, letting the wire overheat long before the fuse gives out. Plaster walls and old framing make new runs slower to fish, so a rewire here is planned room by room, working from the attic and the basement with as few openings in the plaster as the job allows.

The historic district adds a step. Work that changes the outside of a house, such as a new meter location or service mast, may also need approval from the city’s Architectural Review Board. Worthington runs its own building department, so permits and inspections for a panel change or new circuits come from the city, not from Columbus.

Postwar Ranches and Split-Levels

The houses built here from the 1950s into the 1970s often have a 100-amp panel, sometimes smaller, and the earliest have two-prong outlets with no ground. Some still have a Federal Pacific or Zinsco panel, both known for breakers that may not trip when they should. Finished lower levels and basements often run off one or two circuits and a tangle of extension cords. They need outlets, lighting circuits and smoke alarms of their own, and a sump pump is better off on a circuit that nothing else can trip. Before central air, a heat pump or a car charger goes in, the house may also need a larger panel.

Aluminum Wiring in Some 1965–73 Houses

For a few years around the late 1960s and early 1970s, some builders used aluminum wire for the branch circuits. Aluminum expands and contracts more than copper and oxidizes at its connections, so outlets and switches can loosen and run hot over time. Warm cover plates, flickering lights and outlets that work only some of the time are the usual signs. Where the cable shows in the basement or attic, its jacket may be marked “AL” or “Aluminum.”

The accepted repair does not mean replacing every run. A short copper pigtail is joined to each aluminum wire with a connector rated for the job, such as AlumiConn or COPALUM, and the outlets and switches connect to the copper. Ordinary twist-on connectors are not a substitute.

• Where We WorkColumbus and the four towns beside it, with their ZIP codes.
• Rewiring & RepairOld splices, worn grounding and aluminum connections put right.