Glad it helped

You're very welcome!

You’re welcome. Glad it was helpful.

The best way in an old house is to install a gfci breaker on your main panel. There expensive but worth it . Ps who uses power tools on outlets.

Thanks,

@@joerostkowski7313 So where do you plug them in, your quantum power back

Are all the outlets in the circuit going to be unprotected from damange to electronics or just the GFCI outlet that he put in the first outlet of the chain?

@@vincentnguyen1603 The GFCI Outlet gives the same protection to every outlet away from the circuit breaker box as it has itself. What GFCI checks is to see that the current coming into it (HOT) is equal to the current leaving (NEUTRAL). So if the HOT is bringing in 10amps, but some outlet further up is dumping some amperage into a toddler (for example), the returning current going to the GFCI NEUTRAL will be less than 10 amps (9.95 amps for instance). Since those are not the same, the GFCI will trip.

Thank you

You're welcome.

Thank you. Glad you enjoyed.

Well, I am glad I could help a little bit. It is pretty simple, and it will definitely make your home safer. Good luck with this future project.

Be careful i had the same issue in this property (50's-60's concrete building) turned out there was one of the alternate systems which ruined my computer and multiple apple adapters. My computer died when voltage came through the fake ground in the outlet and found its way to the telegraph pole outside through my computers lan cable. Very fried board. Electrician said it was safe ....safe like this guys thing..wont kill you apparently but will ruin your equipment. Ive found 2 outlets in the whole house that have a true ground and dont return voltage from the negative down the earth cable. Only good for lightbulbs.

Glad it helped!

Glad you liked it!

@@morganinspectionservices3840 444

I’m glad I was able to help.

I saw a video where a guy replaced a 2 prong outlet with a 3 prong outlet, ALL he did was re hook the 2 wires to the new outlet and shoved it back in the box. IS THIS ok or not.

Glad it was helpful.

Thank you and you’re welcome.

You are welcome.

Thanks. I appreciate the feedback. Hope it helps you.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 so what can i do if the house doesn’t have a ground cable in the walls? How to i protect against surge? If the first in the chain is GFCI’d will it shit off and prevent the others in the chain from power surging?

@@elcubanito001 First of all, I need to say the GFCI‘s are not designed to prevent or protect against electrical surges. The home grounding system is designed to dissipate electrical surges into the ground. GFCI’s are only designed to protect someone from being electrocuted if there is a ground fault due to a fault or damaged piece of equipment. If you properly install a GFCI-protected receptacle as the first receptacle in the “chain,“ it will protect all other receptacles that are supplied from the GFCI-protected receptacle. All of those receptacles will be protected even if there is no ground wire connected to the receptacles. I hope this answers your question.

Glad it was helpful!

Glad I could help

Thank you.

I appreciate the feedback. If this video helps to just make one home a little bit safer, it will have been well worth my time.

Thanks for the feedback. You are correct.

Thanks for the feedback.

Thank you!

Thank you for the feedback. Glad it was helpful.

Thanks

Glad you liked it

You're welcome

Thanks!

Most welcome!

Good advice!

Great advice. Thanks.

If something requires grounding, then this method will obviously not work. If the box is metal, and if conduit was used then you can use a pigtail from the receptacle’s ground screw directly to the box to ground it. Otherwise, you have no choice but to run new wire or at least a ground wire from the panel box to the receptacle you need to ground.

Great tip!

You are 100% correct. It is not as safe as an outlet that is grounded, because power will have already been shut off to a grounded outlet while an outlet protected by a GFCI will not lose power until someone touches it, and creates the “ground fault.” However, an ungrounded outlet protected by a GFCI is MUCH safer than a simple ungrounded outlet.

Thank you

Suggest contacting a licensed electrician for appropriate corrective measures. There is a way to safely use the aluminum wiring. Each device has to be protected. Do some research. I am not an electrician, but I’m privy to information in my business. Again, contact licensed electrician.

Look for outlets and switches that are labeled CU/AL. As it copper (CU) or aluminum. These days lots of devices are labeled for this use.

They must be labeled "CU/AL" in order to be used with aluminum wiring.

I am aware of that. I was just trying to speed things up a little. I should have at least mentioned that there are various ways to disconnect the wires. Thanks for the feedback.

The receptacles I have, have a hole next to the back-stab hole that you can push a nail or something into to release the spring. That aside, avoid using those ridiculous back-stab holes at all costs. They're not reliable. One comes loose and everything downstream goes out. They're obviously made for quick, slipshod operations like manufactured housing operations, not for people like us, who have to live with them.

@@donf3739 Agree 110% on not using the spring-loaded backstabs. I do like what this guy does at 11:35 in lieu of wrapping the conductor around the screw. Bill @ Sparky Channel typically does the same. (But I’d probably still use a manual screwdriver.)

@@peacefrog0521 Yes, I like to have control of how tight to tighten it. I believe the author concurred with that later also.

So called "backstabbed" receptacles are ok for low wattage loads, but for appliances like electric fireplace or heaters with1250 watt load then they tend to heat up and melt the plastic, so please use the screw terminals.

How does one check to see if a metal box is suitable for a ground? This is my exact situation with a home from the 50's and I'm installing GFCIs in each of the kid's rooms but they also have metal outlet boxes.

@@kevinlyman1 Yes I'd like to know as well...can a receptacle (duplex) be made grounded by running a suitable wire from the grounding post ON THE RECEPTACLE to a grounding screw attached to THE METAL HOUSING the receptacle is mounted in? Thanks

I’m not sure what you’re asking here, but if I’m guessing correctly, yes, it is possible that the beginning outlet or the first outlet in the daisychain could be located in the basement.

Unless the receptacle is installed in a grounded metal box, installing a ground wire will not help. Any receptacle must be grounded back to the panel in order for the a ground wire to do any good.

Good advice

So what kind of lights do you get on a plug-in tester? And what happens when you push the test and reset buttons?

Thanks. That is a good way to remember.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 , I always remember the movie that came out the year I was born (1947 ) named Black Gold. Good movie which has saved me from shock many times when wiring :)

Ive got red, white, black, green, striped green, blue and brown in my house 😂 gotta love labourers who can do electrics huh. 🤦 Landlords an idiot.

There is no need to put the ungrounded outlet label. It wouldn't hurt to put the "GFCI protected" label though.

Thanks for the info.

It al depends on how the house was wired. You need a GFCI at the start of each circuit - wherever the circuit starts. This may be one per room, but it is possible to have multiple rooms on one circuit. It will require some investigating to determine this.

Sure. The circuit doesn't care if its fed from breakers or fuses, so it does not matter at all.

First, is it an old home with originally two prong outlets? Then you can use the GFCI method. If it is a new home with just somehow broken ground then that is not an option. Note the GFCI does not fix the open ground.

Yes, I should have wrapped the outlet with tape before putting it back into the wall. Thanks.

There is no code that says an outlet has to be wrap with tape.

Didn't mentioned to wrap by electrical tape "but" for safety reason peace.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 what is the rationale for taping?

@@jamomeara1894 it helps keep it from arcing to or from wires, box, stud etc... an extra safety device if you will. Nothing wrong with being too careful!

GFCIs are designed to protect people from electrocution. They do nothing to protect connected equipment. By the same token, grounding the receptacles don't protect equipment. About the only way to protect equipment is with the home's grounding system (ground rod and grounding electrode conductor) and surge protectors.

If lightning strikes the wires your equipment will be toast no matter what. It is the grounding of the neutral that protects against voltage induced by lightning. Computers do not mind being ungrounded. There may be problems with equipment you connect the computer. Ideally you should use WiFi. In any case do connections powered down. Ungrounded computers put about half the mains voltage to the case and you may feel this if you touch it and something grounded. (not recommended), the current is just 0.5 mA so it is not dangerous on a working computer.

The box was not grounded, so connecting a ground would not have helped.

14v seems an odd number...have you unplugged all your wall wart chargers etc? If theyve linked all the ground lines together maybe theres something else in the circuit discharging power. Not much takes 14v...main suspect to me would be a computer monitor as they use odd voltages. Perhaps a laptop with a 14v battery is plugged in someplace? May be active because the circuit isnt correct....just throwing some options im no electrician.

@@luminousfractal420 Hi. There could have been a laptop plugged in on the 1st, or 2nd floor. I ended up installing the gfci, and this was a basement Outlet, and it is working fine. Gfci even tests properly, and has ground. I thought it the gfci would not be grounded, as I did not see any green or bare copper wire in the receptacle. But, the GFCI does test as having a ground also. This is an old house built around 1928, and a few of the other gfcis that I thought were lacking a ground, actually tested good for a ground also. I think there are ground wires going to the water pipes, which are galvanized steel. So the ground system might well be all tied together. One other thing I noticed after all this, I was replacing some incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs in the basement also, and they all seem to work fine except for on one bulb outlet. The incandescent bulb was working fine, but when I tried to put an LED in it flickered and then would not stay on. I tested that led in other lamp fixtures and it worked well everywhere else. So, I ended up leaving the incandescent bulb in, and and it still works fine. It got me wondering if maybe that bulb fixture was on the same line as the GFCI that I just put in, or, wondering why else would an incandescent bulb work in a lamp fixture, but not an LED?

The whole point of the video was to show how to make the receptacle safe if there is no ground available. In this case, since the metal box was not grounded, running a ground wire from the ground screw to the box would not have helped..

@@morganinspectionservices3840 I'm confused because other videos show the box not grounded but they ran a ground wire from the box to the GFCI my question is would that help or not

@@babyboinews6896 no expert here but i believe only if the box is grounded would it benefit you to run a ground wire from the box to the GFCI..otherwise it would provide no help

@@USArmy91222 and by that you mean it should be a metal box to be grounded right

@@babyboinews6896 yes, my house was built in the 50's and has all metal boxes..a simple way to tell if your box is grounded is to get a inexpensive tester..put the red lead of the tester into the smaller slot of the outlet and take the black lead and just touch the screw that holds the cover in place..if you get a reading 110v it's grounded..

One GFCI will protect all of the receptacles downstream of it on the same circuit. You would have to install enough GFCI receptacles so that all other receptacles in the home are protected.

It protects the outlets downstream that is you need at least as many GFCIs as there are breakers but remember there is no rule that you need to change every outlet. If there are locations where you do not need the third prong you can leave them alone. (assuming there is no illegally installed three prong outlet)

No. There would be no problem using a 15-amp outlet. I used a 20-amp outlet because there was #12 wire running to the outlet.

The normal receptacle tester with a little push button to test the GFCI will not trip one that is not grounded, but the built-in test button on the outlet will test and trip the GFCI outlet.

It depends. Code enforcement people realize that doing this is much safer than leaving the outlets ungrounded and unprotected, so in some places they will work with you and be happy for any safety upgrades that you do. Is it completely up to today’s electrical code? No. I would suggest you talk to the code enforcement people in your city and see what they say about it.

You’re sure that all those outlets are on the same circuit? It’s unusual that five outlets on the same circuit would be wired without daisychaining them together. If that is the case, then you will have to install a GFCI outlet at each of those five locations. Another option would be to install a GFCI breaker, and that would accomplish the same thing - and would be much quicker to do. You would have to do some research to see exactly what’s required to install a GFCI breaker, but it’s not too difficult.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 yes they are all on the same circuit, when I kill the breaker, all 5 of them had no power

@@chrisbrown6804 Then they are likely all tied together in a junction box somewhere. I think the previous solution I gave yesterday is likely the best way to add the GFCI protection.

Great question. If you are pushing the test button on the receptacle itself, it should trip regardless of whether it’s grounded or not. If this is what you are pushing, and it is not tripping, then there is a problem that needs to be found and corrected. If you have a separate receptacle tester with built-in GFCI tester, and you’re pushing that button, then that button will not trip a GFCI receptacle that is not grounded.

I would not say that the NEC requires this protection, but it permits this protection. It allows a GFCI-protected receptacle to be installed where there is no equipment ground. Due to grandfathering, the NEC does not require things like this to be installed to bring a house up to modern codes/standards. However, the NEC does permit such installation, and this installation will make a home safer. I am a home inspector, and as such, I regularly call out as a deficiency the lack of grounds on receptacles. While the NEC does not require a house to be brought up to current codes, and a home inspection cannot enforce/require the same, we still call it out as a deficiency. Section 406.4(D)(2) of the NEC covers what is required when a three-prong receptacle is installed in place of an ungrounded (two-prong) receptacle.

If there is only one black and one white wire, then that is either the last outlet in the daisychain, or it is fed directly from a breaker, which is unlikely. At any rate, you just need to connect the black and white wire as described in the video to the screws labeled “line.“ If you are trying to protect multiple outlets with a GFCI, and this is the one you found, then you need to keep looking because this one will definitely not be the first one in the daisy chain.

"Line" is where the wires supplying power to the outlet are connected. "Load" is where the outlets are connected that you want to protect with the GFCI. Lights are not normally protected by GFCIs.

Yes. You can. That is no problem. It just is not normally necessary. If the outlets are tied together (daisy chained), then one GFCI can protect several standard outlets.

NEC disagrees.

I'm sorry but it sounds like you need to study up some on electrical issues. A GFCI makes ungrounded outlets much safer than with no GFCI.

Incorrect. It won't protect your equipment, but it will protect you.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 much safer but applies all the protection of a true ground?

@@luminousfractal420 The person above who said “it won’t protect your equipment” does not understand the purpose of the ground wire. It’s ONLY purpose is to protect people. It does not protect equipment. The home’s grounding electrode system protects equipment. I would certainly prefer to have my home’s receptacles grounded than to use the method I show in this video, but this method does make the home much safer than doing nothing.

That is very correct. A handheld tester (three light tester) with a GFCI test button will not work on an ungrounded receptacle. You must use the test button that is built into the receptacle itself. The reason it will not work is because the button on the handheld tester utilizes the ground wire on the receptacle to create a “ground fault.“ Without the ground wire, pushing this button does nothing.

@@morganinspectionservices3840 Yet the test button on the GFCI (ungrounded circuit) Does function. comment please

GFCIs do not protect appliances. They are designed to prevent electrocutions.

TVs typically are double insulated so they do not care of the protective grounding. Computers use grounding. You should be careful if ypou connect a computer to a TV with this. Do not plug when the computer is running. Computers generate voltage on the case. This is about half the mains voltage and if it is not grounded you can feel that if you touch it and something grounded (in general not a good idea) but it is not dangerous. The current is about 0.5 mA.

Yes. The whole purpose of the video is to show how to make ungrounded outlets safer by installing a GFCI outlet.

In my experience the GFCI outlets will not work correctly without a ground. You still need to provide a good ground to the GFCI in order to protect the loaded circuit that follows. If you try to test that GFCI without a ground with a GFCI tester, the tester will not only show that it is wired incorrectly but that GFCI will not trip/reset after being shorted. Thus making GFCI having no more purpose than a regular ungrounded outlet. It is, after all called a GROUND FAULT CIRCUIT INTERUPTOR after all.

@@robertgarcia584 Read the instructions when you buy one. It says connect to grounding wire (only if there is a grounding wire). It does not say the unit can't be used. The GFCI receptacle looks at stray voltage on both the ground and the neutral lines, so it will interrupt if there is an imbalance between the hot and neutral as well.

Thank you.

Are you asking about the tester having two lights or what?

Only if the outlet is grounded. It's still not grounded, just ground fault protected. As commented by others, he also needed to apply a "no equipment ground" to the GFCI outlet cover plate.

The outlet is safer because it is GFCI protected, but it is still not grounded. I have never dealt with tesla chargers, but if they do not work if the outlet is not grounded, then it will still not work even with the GFCI.

Thanks. A video with a better explanation of line and load is coming soon.

Take the "L" off of 'LINE' and first two letters then are 'IN' (INcoming) power. L 'O' A D side of GFCI = 'O' utgoing power. Is how I can remember the electricity " IN " & " O " (Out) .

I’ve read not to do this as it’s not necessary. What is your rationale for taping?

Yes, all outlets in a daisychain are wired in parallel. All outlets in every house/building are always wired in parallel. If they were not wired in parallel, the 120 V would be divided up among the outlets based on the loads that were running on those outlets. Only by wiring in parallel will you have 120 V at each outlet.

Please cite where in the NEC it says to do so...Karen.

@@brianreinhardt4050 It doesn't but it's good to have should you box be metal.

Not a bad idea, but not required as far as I know.

If the metal box is not grounded, connecting a ground wire will not ground the outlet. If it were that easy to ground outlet, that would sure be nice.

I suppose they don't want the labels to match the outlets because they want them to stand out an be obvious.

The outlets I got from amazon were white with black lettering and small. you can also just buy the labels from ebay and they're also white with black lettering.

You are absolutely correct, but a GFCI outlet makes a non-grounded outlet a lot safer than it was.

He never said it did!

Grounding has nothing to do with voltage spikes. It is use for personal protection in case of an equipment failure.

@@okaro6595 Lightning and surge protection devices work by routing voltage surges and spikes away from the electrical components they are protecting and dispersing it to a ground plane, such as the earth or a copper pipe inside of a building. Every grounding system therefore consists of two main components: the protection device that routes the damaging signals and the ground connection the signals are routed to. It is important that both components are in place and properly utilized. One without the other, or one properly implemented with the other improperly implemented, is the same as no surge protection system at all.

@@metalhalide4043 Surge protectors have varistors between each wire pair so they work also without grounding. Maybe they work better with grounding. Now there are some issues in running computer ungrounded. Plug your peripherals on the same power strip so it levels the potentials. If one wants to be extra sure one an use WiFi instead of Ethernet. Do not connect it to TV. Instead use other ways to stream like Chromecast. However many people use computers ungrounded without any problems