The house was built in 1973 and the head carpenter died before it was finished, so there are lots of loose ends. I was hanging a new flourescent light and noticed the cut off wires in a few places just sticking out in space. There is little chance of them shocking someone; you would have to be on a ladder and reach above your head to touch them. And, they may not even be hot. But, it should be an easy job to terminate them properly and it's on my mind, that's going to be a project. Is the a gizmo you attach to the ends or some other way?

1- Get a non contact electrical sensor.
2- Test each romex line. If it's hot, you'll have to put it into a box, then put a wire nut on each wire. Tight. Wrap with electrical tape if you want to. Then close the box. Best thing is to also find a way to figure out which breaker it's on, and mark the box accordingly.

Everyone should have one of these gizmos.
[www.amazon.com]

What cbelt wrote! Never put an open fist over a wire to test (never do that in general but still).

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Hurts like a bastid...

Plastic or metal box?

[Plastic or metal box?]

Probably either one will do. What ever you use should have a cover and clamps for the wire going into it.

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Dennis S
Plastic or metal box?

Either if that is okay with local code. Otherwise use the type required by code in your area.

It’s been fine for 46 years, why change now?

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Yeah, terminate in a box and hopefully note where it ended.

If the wires are dead: clip off any stripped ends, spiral wrap a double layer of electrical tape over the last 2 inches, bend an inch back on itself and wrap again, tuck in box and close.

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In tha 360. MRF User Map

IMO - if you see a reason for the run, just terminate as others have stated. Otherwise remove it.

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We had a couple of runs of 12-3 wire put into our house from the 2nd story attic down to the basement when we built. They are curled at the ends and labelled, although the label is getting very faint. We did it just in case we needed an extra circuit up there. Perhaps these are the same?

I would terminate it into a GROUNDED metal box.

Do note that some areas have wild code requirements... Chicago is particularly difficult, as I recall. EMT for even internal wiring. (May have changed over the years). They still remember that fire.,,

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Michael
We had a couple of runs of 12-3 wire put into our house from the 2nd story attic down to the basement when we built. They are curled at the ends and labelled, although the label is getting very faint. We did it just in case we needed an extra circuit up there. Perhaps these are the same?

I'm pretty sure these wires were for a planned finished basement but when the head carpenter died, a lot of things were halted and never fnished.

If they turn out to be live, might it make sense to actually put an outlet in the box and wire them to that, so that someone in the future can more easily test it to see that it's live and figure out which breaker it's on.

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GGD
If they turn out to be live, might it make sense to actually put an outlet in the box and wire them to that, so that someone in the future can more easily test it to see that it's live and figure out which breaker it's on.

That's a good idea. I can plug in the flourescent lights up there as well as some box fans and hang the fans from the joists/rafters and not have orange extension cords all over the place.