Older Home outlet problems


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Old 05-21-03, 03:16 PM
montesa
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Older Home outlet problems

I live in a home that was built back in the 50's. Most of the outlets in the home are 2 prong non-grounded outlets. I want to know how I can add a ground or if a GFCI would suffice instead of adding a ground wire. Been trying to locate information on this, but no one seems to have information on how to switch a non-grounded outlet to a new 3 prong grounded outlet. Any ideas, suggestions? Thanks for any help.
 
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Old 05-21-03, 04:31 PM
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You generally have three choices. Depends on whether you want a ground connection or just a way of connecting three prong plugs. Which do you want, and we can advise.
 
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Old 05-21-03, 05:28 PM
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A GFCI will provide personal protection, and allow the use of a three-prong plug, but it will not provide protection for sensitive electronic equipment. For the latter, you need a true grounding wire back to the panel.
 
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Old 05-21-03, 05:39 PM
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The National Electrical Code allows ungrounded receptacles to be replaced by GFCI receptacles. If there are more than one receptacle on the circuit they can be fed from the same GFCI(maximum of 5 as per the GFCI recomendations) and replaced with regular Receptacles but they must be labled as ungrounded. There is usually stickers included with the GFCI for this purpose.
 
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Old 05-21-03, 06:47 PM
montesa
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I would like to ground the outlets, but with the way our house is set up (mostly brick walls) I don't know how hard it would be to thread new wires in. If I replace the outlets with a GFCI would that cause "phantom" tripping like I read in an article earlier? I don't know how many outlets are on one circuit, but if I replaced all of them with GFCI would it cause this problem?
 
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Old 05-21-03, 07:27 PM
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If you don't know how they are circuited, then replace all with GFCI, each connected to the line side and no connecitons to the load side. That way all will protect only themselves.
 
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Old 05-22-03, 06:02 AM
Van356
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Even though the outlets are the 2 prong non-grounded type, most likely there is a ground conductor for the circuit wiring. You can test the circuit with a voltmeter or a simple neon light outlet tester to determine the presence of a ground.
Have you checked to see if there is possibly a ground conductor in the outlet device box? If the wiring is the armor cable variety, the outlet is grounded through the metal box itself. I've never seen a house built in the 50's that didn't have a ground conductor in the wiring circuits, but I guess it's possible.
 
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Old 05-22-03, 10:28 AM
montesa
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Okay, you are talking to someone who has no background with electrical wiring and such so would the ground conductor be a green wire in the device box but just not connected? Not sure what I would be looking for. Some of the wiring in the house looks like it was put in after the house was built, but there are about 3 different fuse boxes for our house. What a mess. Also, if the outlet is grounded to the metal box itself, how would I be able to tell. Sorry for all the questions, but I just want to make sure I do this right! Thanks for everyone's feedback!
 
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Old 05-22-03, 01:33 PM
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If your house was constructed in the 50's, the outlet-boxes for the receptacles would be metal boxes. The cables between the individual boxes and between the boxes and the fuse-panels could be either metallic or non-metallic.

If you have metal cables then you have a reliable Grounding path. If you have non-metallic cables then the cables MUST have a bare Grounding wire along with the Black & White insulated wires.----Examine the cables that connect at the fuse-box. If they are non-metallic then remove the fuse-box cover and look for bare Ground wires along with the Black/White wires.-----Good Luck!!!
 
 

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