What did school not prepare you for in electrical work?

[Alan]

What’s the biggest difference you felt between book knowledge and real world electrical work, and what was the first situation that made it obvious.

I’m especially interested in the moments where everything was technically correct, but the job still fought you. Like working around existing bad installs, dealing with customers, finding the actual fault, or doing clean work in a house that’s anything but clean.

Drop your story and what you do differently now because of it. If you want, mention if you’re mostly residential, commercial, or industrial since the messy parts probably show up in different ways.

 

[Sterling]

Real work is diagnosing hidden bad installs, no diagram survives first contact with the actual house wiring.