# Old High/Low Votlage System Replacment WOW



## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

Hi everyone,
Thought I would share some photos of old touchplate ripout. 
When I walked up in to the attic and turned on the light I did one of these  and I asked the home owner, who tried to fix it (after a bunch of lights were no longer working from the old relays that burned) and she said "My husband" :no:

Anyhow pulled the old one and installed a brand new touch plate system because all the switch legs in the house are low voltage and it was cheaper than doing switch drops for the home owner. Enjoy guys!


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## Vintage Sounds (Oct 23, 2009)

Nice work. It looks like you've worked on a few of these before. Very clean.


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## erics37 (May 7, 2009)

First time I've ever seen one of these upgraded instead of just ripped out or left alone. Good work!


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## sbrn33 (Mar 15, 2007)

What brand and model did you actually use to replace it? I like it.
Good job.


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## ampman (Apr 2, 2009)

nice work


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

Vintage Sounds said:


> Nice work. It looks like you've worked on a few of these before. Very clean.


Thanks! This was the first one. I came from a low voltage background before becoming a high voltage electrician. I just followed the manual and marked the circuits prior and only had to tone out a few wall switches.


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

sbrn33 said:


> What brand and model did you actually use to replace it? I like it.
> Good job.


The system is made by Touchplate and you can see their products at www.touchplate.com. The model is an LT-L-2. The size of the can is how many relays you need. My case I needed 12 relays and I purchased the one with 20AMP rate relays because they also have a 15AMP version as well. From what I understand this appeared in some homes as a smart home option  The master control station where see the blue lights controls the relays. In this case this master station was in the home owners bedroom and she can turn off every light in the house from her bed as well as turn lights in. It's pretty cool but I personally in my home in installed a Honeywell Vista 128BPT with a Tuxcedo Touch Keypad and all my leviton switches are z-wave controlled in which I can operate my lights, thermostats etc. all from my iphone or web browser. I also tied card access (vista-key) to my home and I have mag locks on my doors and card readers outside  My father and I own an operate an alarm company as well as our electrical company as well.


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## jeffmoss26 (Dec 8, 2011)

Very nice work. It looks 2000 times better!!
Do your alarm panels look this clean? I sure hope so


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## sbrn33 (Mar 15, 2007)

I honestly thought they were out of business. Learn something new everyday.


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## jeffmoss26 (Dec 8, 2011)

I know a guy who still has an older touchplate system in his house, with a supply of replacement relays. I took one look at the thing, and turned away LOL


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## niteshift (Nov 21, 2007)

What a cluster  that original was.
Your new one is top notch.:thumbsup:
I only did two homes that had low voltage set ups, they looked pretty much like the first pic. Didn't do an upgrade, just replaced devices throughout the home. I remember one had the relay's in the attic. Original switches I think were push button style.


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## McClary’s Electrical (Feb 21, 2009)

Thank you, thank you , thank you!! Most idiots ripp all that stuff out because they have no idea how to work on it. It's SSOOOO nice to NOT see somebody remove a cadillac system and down grade it VW. 

GOOD JOB!


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

jeffmoss26 said:


> Very nice work. It looks 2000 times better!!
> Do your alarm panels look this clean? I sure hope so


Thanks and yes my panels always look great and I document everything including using Doc boxes for fire alarms so inspections are not crumpled in the panel. Notice the first pic below. They ran the romex right thru the back of the panel with no grommet, connector etc..You can't see it but it was there. I ended up mounting a separate power supply (fire red by Honewell) above the panel which is a 120 to 12V transformer in a box and takes the current bulky supply out of the panel.

Here is an ADT pic of what I walked into:









And after :thumbup:









Brand new install I did at a church.


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## jeffmoss26 (Dec 8, 2011)

Now THAT is what I like to see! 
I hate opening up fire or burglar alarm panels to work on phone lines, only to get hit in the face with a mess of wires!


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

jeffmoss26 said:


> Now THAT is what I like to see!
> I hate opening up fire or burglar alarm panels to work on phone lines, only to get hit in the face with a mess of wires!


I agree 100%. Sometimes I walked into an IT room to run cable 
above the ceiling and I find myself tripping over patch cords that are 6 feet long that only need to be 1 foot max going from switch to router etc..
IT rooms are like big alarm panels sometimes, I open the door and I want to run to my truck, grab my label maker, RJ-45 Crimper, & connectors and fix the whole room :no:

There are still guys out there who take pride in their work and I love what I do and helping my customers and turns out my dad (also an electrician) and I are making a great living running our company.


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

jeffmoss26 said:


> I know a guy who still has an older touchplate system in his house, with a supply of replacement relays. I took one look at the thing, and turned away LOL


I almost did the same but I had to help this family. They have two little kids and I could not walk away knowing about the fire hazard. The panel cost 702.00 and the switches were 12.00 ea and I charged 6 hours labor @ 75/hr and I was there for 12 hours. At the end of the day I could sleep at night :thumbup:


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

mcclary's electrical said:


> Thank you, thank you , thank you!! Most idiots ripp all that stuff out because they have no idea how to work on it. It's SSOOOO nice to NOT see somebody remove a cadillac system and down grade it VW.
> 
> GOOD JOB!


Thanks! 
This thing is a Ferrari now lol..:laughing: plus I saved them a whole lot of money than doing conventional wiring. I have to admit the push buttons are terrible. They did call me back to replace a Nutone fan and run additional cable 12/3 to separate the fan and light etc..


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## jeffmoss26 (Dec 8, 2011)

The guy I know didn't ask me to work on the system (thankfully!)...I happened to be at his house working on a phone jack and he said 'hey come take a look at this' and showed me where all the panels were. He owns a couple office buildings and I am good friends with the maintenance guy...he was working on the system not too long ago, just had to replace some relays. I think it's all original from the 70s or 80s when the house was built.


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## user4818 (Jan 15, 2009)

Ever done a fire alarm in RI? You'd be hating life. 

As for the Touchplate upgrade, it looks great. But they're called "receptacles", not "plugs."


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## niteshift (Nov 21, 2007)

Another great example of your work.:thumbsup: 
You said, 
I agree 100%. Sometimes I walked into an IT room to run cable 
above the ceiling and I find myself tripping over patch cords that are 6 feet long that only need to be 1 foot max going from switch to router etc..
I agree with all that, ours is almost that bad, and have to add that under the raised flooring is another world. Upgrades and abandoned in place, not too much concrete visible under there anymore.:no:
You ever see the nitrogen filled antenna cable. It's like an anaconda.:laughing: 
It too is now abandoned in place.


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

jeffmoss26 said:


> The guy I know didn't ask me to work on the system (thankfully!)...I happened to be at his house working on a phone jack and he said 'hey come take a look at this' and showed me where all the panels were. He owns a couple office buildings and I am good friends with the maintenance guy...he was working on the system not too long ago, just had to replace some relays. I think it's all original from the 70s or 80s when the house was built.


That's usually how it starts. "oh by the way since you are here" 
I walk into jobs just going to replace an outlet and I always pop the cover off their panel and sure enough 7 out of 10 I'm getting paid to rewire the panel. 
70's or 80's. They made good relays back then.


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

Peter D said:


> Ever done a fire alarm in RI? You'd be hating life.
> 
> As for the Touchplate upgrade, it looks great. But they're called "receptacles", not "plugs."


Ever since that fire in RI I know they became very strict with their installation requirements. I do not know details because we are licensed in CT and stay in CT. I wouldn't be hating life, the more work the better :thumbup:. 
I know electrically "receptacles" are the correct term but I also think about the customer and label it plug or outlet depending on their preference because most times when you call it a receptacle they say "what's that?" :whistling2:


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

niteshift said:


> Another great example of your work.:thumbsup:
> You said,
> I agree 100%. Sometimes I walked into an IT room to run cable
> above the ceiling and I find myself tripping over patch cords that are 6 feet long that only need to be 1 foot max going from switch to router etc..
> ...


Thank you for the kind comment on my work. I have worked in the raised floors. There was an electrician who was killed by a raised floor in Newington, CT. Apparently they were working on an IT center and the electrician forgot to lockout, tag-out went to work in the raised floor to pull cable and another electrician turned on a breaker that made the grid live and killed the electrician working in the grid.


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## jeffmoss26 (Dec 8, 2011)

You should see some of the phone rooms I walk into around here...almost impossible to do any work neatly because of how the last guy left things...


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## joedreamliner787 (Sep 27, 2011)

jeffmoss26 said:


> You should see some of the phone rooms I walk into around here...almost impossible to do any work neatly because of how the last guy left things...


And the last guy, and the last before him, and the guy before him


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## user4818 (Jan 15, 2009)

joedreamliner787 said:


> Ever since that fire in RI I know they became very strict with their installation requirements. I do not know details because we are licensed in CT and stay in CT. I wouldn't be hating life, the more work the better :thumbup:.


They were strict even before the fire, but got much worse after. For instance, no wirenuts are allowed on ANY fire alarm conductors, not even ground wires. The only wirenuts you can use are connecting the power supply transformer to the branch circuit. The rules are ridiculous.


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## kaperevets (May 26, 2014)

Hello ,everyone. Just wanted to say that this was a great thread, and i joined the forum because of it. I am a new electrician and controls tech at a Ng compressor station and a coworker "mechanic" called me about a friends house with some odd wiring that he had never seen before. I had a hunch as to what it was, and after some googling got me here i am certain that is what the lady is dealing with. 1970's construction and all. Looks like touchplate has some replacment parts still availible for the older systems with transverters and relays in attic j boxes. Unfortunatly with closing on my own house and work, im not for much time for side projects. But i was able to point them in the right direction.

In any case, loved the thread, new to forums (for a late 20's) so ill look up all of the "imho" jargon 'nsuch.


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## guy2073 (May 4, 2011)

Looks great. I would have closed up the attic and snuck out to my truck.


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