Stripped a 30-year-old wire nut with my bare hands yesterday...

I was swapping out a ceiling fan in a house built in 1993 and the wire nut just crumbled when I twisted it... turns out the plastic gets super brittle after a few decades in the attic heat. Has anyone else run into old wire nuts failing like that mid-job?

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finleyf883mo ago

Ha, guess I'm not the only one whose grip strength peaked in the 90s.

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simons283mo ago

Yeah, that's a common thing with older wire nuts for sure. I had a whole box of them from the late 80s just fall apart when I tried to twist them on a lighting job last year. The heat cycles in attics really do a number on the plastic over time.

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