I don't test anything. Your pre-drywall wiring shouldn't have any faults unless you did something really stupid. Most faults occur at the terminations (which you should not have been doing yet) or by some other trade drilling through (which will likely happen after this testing).

Same here.
It would be extrmely rare that a pro "tests" his wiring prior to the walls being closed up.

I do test. Takes more time than I like, but occasionally finds a problem. Drunken insulation installer stapled the fiberglass bat flanges to the side of the studs at the request of the GC since the drywall was to be both screwed and "glued". The sot drove several staples into the NM cable with his spring-powered stapler. The insulation company paid me for the correction. I power the conductors with a 60 watt incandescent in series. Puts full voltage on the conductors but does not cause arcing of significance if there is a problem. If the lamp lights, it indicates a ground fault.

I don't test outlet wiring, but I like to check lighting circuits. I have forgotten to hook up a connection in a box on a recessed can before. If I had not found that, I would have been tearing into drywall after because of the location the can was in, I could not get to it from the attic.

But then again... I'm not a pro =)

Grant, a pro would have known that you can remove the can from below to get at the junction box. ;)

A new construction can? I can't see how I can do that. hmmmmm I have used Commercial Electric and HALO cans.

Yes, a new construction can. It has to be removable or else the installation would be in most cases illegal as the junction box has to be accessible. Generally, you have to bend some tabs to release the can from the mount and then it pulls down through the hole allowing you to reach the junction box.

Is it a bad idea to test new wiring by stripping the wire at the point where the panel will eventually be and temporarily push the wire into an extension cord that will be plugged into an existing hot outlet?

jrieber,
Did you read the rest of this thread? There's no need to test, so there's really no need to test by kludging something together with an extension cord.

I think Ron said it best:
Your pre-drywall wiring shouldn't have any faults unless you did
something really stupid. Most faults occur at the terminations (which
you should not have been doing yet) or by some other trade drilling
through (which will likely happen after this testing).

If your drywall is already up and the terminations are all done and the only thing that you're waiting on is getting a new panel so that you can hook up the wiring, then there is no advantage to 'testing' the wiring with a temporary hookup instead of just waiting.

I did read the thread but I don't understand why there is no need to test. It is very possible, although hopefully not likely, that I did in fact do something really stupid. And if I did, I would like to find out now rather than later. It is probably pretty clear by now that I am far from experienced with electrical projects and am learning a lot as I go. It makes sense that pros don't see the benefit in testing but they are much less likely to screw something up than I am.

Then I guess the question is what do you think you'll catch by testing the wiring?
Do you have 3 or 4 way switches that you aren't sure that you ran the correct number of wires for? Because other than that, I can't think of anything that is so complicated that testing would help out. If you can visually see that the cable goes from A to B, then there's no need to hook it up and verify that the electricity flows through that cable properly. Trust me. It will. :)

Most errors would be at the termination points. So no need to check until you're done.

If you really do want to do testing, then I'd suggest that you (temporarily) add a proper male extension cord end onto the house wiring termination and plug it in to the extension cord that way. Just sticking the wires into the holes would make me wary.

I'm assuming that you also plan to add all of the receptacles, switches and lights. And then remove them again after testing so that you can put up drywall.

And if your response is that you have no idea what the problems may be that you'd catch by testing, then with all due respect, I don't think you should be doing electrical work.
Electrical and structural work are two areas of building that I don't think you should learn by trial and error. Errors can kill.
You should know enough to be safe and once you know enough to be safe, then you should already know enough to be confident that you don't have to test your wiring at this stage. Or at the very least, what areas you'd like to test to just double-check your wiring and get a little more peace of mind.

Thanks for the information. It may just be my nature or a product of my profession. I write software for a living and we tend over analyze and test everything. :) I am not exactly sure what I would catch but it would just make me feel better. For example, what if when pulling a wire it caught a screw or something else sharp that nicked the wires? Is it possible that the wire manufacturer sold faulty wire (probably unlikely)? I imagine there are other similar things that can happen. Yes, I would remove all receptacles, switches, etc. before drywall. Your concern about my abilities is justified (trust me, I have wrestled with it as well). Because of that, I am hiring a licensed electrician to hook up the new sub panel to the main panel and (probably more importantly) he is going to look over everything I did to make sure that it is safe. I also pulled a permit so it will be inspected.

Then using software lingo, I'd compare testing the wiring at this point to checking to see if a variable is null when on the previous line you initialize it to a proper value. You can look at the code and see that there is no possibility that the variable is null, so checking it is redundant. But if you want to then go ahead. All it costs you is time. :)

Faulty wire would be extremely rare and really isn't something to worry about. Nicking the wire I guess is possible but I'd say that it's unlikely that you wouldn't notice doing it. Looking at it would a better test and I'm assuming that you were looking at it when you installed it. It would have to be a pretty significant nick in order for a quick test to pick it up.

How are you wiring a new construction house with out a license. Do you know the codes do you even know what your doing or is this house in Mexico.

Most States still allow the owner and occupant of a single family residence to do electrical work on their own home, as well as plumbing, design, or anything else they want.

And it still has to pass inspection.

Wow I wouldn't want to sleep in one of those houses

Interesting!