I live in an older home with both newer and older wiring. I used a receptacle analyzer on the outlets (newer three prong) on my first floor and basement, and was surprised to find each of them read "not grounded" . After reading through a Home Depot electrical book I looked for a grounding wire on the service panel and it does appear to be grounded to a pipe in the basement. Where can I start troubleshooting - I don't know if the problem is with the outlets, the wiring or the service panel ? thanks!

I've recently re-wired my home, and am hitting a snag I can't figure out. I had three old pull-chain light fixtures in my basement. I am re-wiring them so they all work off a switch. The power comes to the fixtures first, then ends at the switch. I understand that I need to bypass the fixtures by making the incoming hot black wire connect to the white, which is now marked black. I continue this hot wire, bypassing the next two fixtures, all connected to white wires, so it connects to the switch without hitting a fixture. The return is black, and now hits each light fixture. The switch works; however, when I do it this way, the lights are very dim. If I remove one light and make a connection (just to eliminate one light), the remaining two get brighter, but still not fully bright. By making it just one light in the series, it then has full power. I have a voltage tester, and it reads 110 volts at each fixture, so I am thinking the problem is with the amperage (as the brightness, which I am reading as wattage, is not as high as it should be when all three lights are in the series). What am I doing wrong? There are a few more mitigating circumstances to this. One of the lines in this run is an old BX wire - it was already run from light 1 to light 2, and I thought I could save some time. Is that somehow reducing the power? Before the power comes to the first fixture, I have two outlets that precede it, and before that it is a direct line to the circuit breaker box. I've tested the two outlets, and they appear fine. Coould the source of the problem be there? One last thing - I am still using the old light fixtures that were there. Could they be the source of the problem? I've attached an illustration of what I am doing.