question about ungrounded 2 prong outlets in older home (countertop, pool, insulated)

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by WorldKlas

I owned a house built in 1954 with copper wiring but 2 prong outlets except I did have GFCI protected outlets for kitchen and furnace. I had an electrician review and he advised me to leave well enough alone. Since I was born in the 1950's and grew up in homes with such wiring, I did recall a couple of "shocks" but no one died! I sold the house last year and it fully passed a VA loan inspection -- and they put safety above everything in granting VA loans to buyers. I did buy several "grounding adaptors" to use tho they are not recommended. Never had an issue other than the house wasn't wired to handle the extra load of today's electronics and I did wind up replacing the old fashioned fuse box with a conventional breaker box for about $1500.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheater_plug

We have cheater plugs all over the house (they're cheap as all get out) but on a couple of things we've simply cut off the ground prong. Obviously I will never advise anyone to do that because there are message boards full of people telling you you'll DIE if you do it, but it's never been a problem chez BigDGeek. Most small appliances don't have a grounding plug anyway. Power tools do, but we use cheater plugs on them. We don't cut the ground prongs off power tools ever because our next house will probably have grounded outlets.

We've also replaced a couple of outlets with GFCI outlets with the big red "no ground" sticker on them...not for grounding (there's none) but to reduce the profile of the plugged-in appliance. We did that with our fridge, for example. No problems.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by BigDGeek

We have cheater plugs all over the house (they're cheap as all get out) but on a couple of things we've simply cut off the ground prong. Obviously I will never advise anyone to do that because there are message boards full of people telling you you'll DIE if you do it, but it's never been a problem chez BigDGeek. Most small appliances don't have a grounding plug anyway. Power tools do, but we use cheater plugs on them. We don't cut the ground prongs off power tools ever because our next house will probably have grounded outlets.

We've also replaced a couple of outlets with GFCI outlets with the big red "no ground" sticker on them...not for grounding (there's none) but to reduce the profile of the plugged-in appliance. We did that with our fridge, for example. No problems.

It's not that you are going to die if you fool around with cheater plugs with 2-prong outlets. It's that your chances of being hurt rise sharply by doing so. Cheater plugs are meant to be grounded directly to a grounding screw or via a wire to say a rod stuck properly into the ground - clearly virtually no one using cheater plugs uses them correctly.

1. IEC Protection Class II......modern small appliances and other items, like you mentioned above, that have 2-prong plugs must be double insulated, usually have only plastic housings or plastic housings with metal parts that are very unlikely to become energized. Secondly, those appliances are made even safer on a GFCI circuit and on most modern homes they will be on GFCI circuits 95% of the time....kitchen, garage, bathroom, outside etc.

2. Ace Frehley the Kiss guitarist was nearly killed at a gig in Florida after a roadie used a cheater plug into an amplifier to stop a ground loop hum problem.
Ultimately Frehley's guitar became energized, he completed the circuit when the grabbed a metal rail its one hand and metal on his guitar (stings- pick-up whatever)

They wrote this song about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iauaDVVPGW8

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by EDS_

It's not that you are going to die if you fool around with cheater plugs with 2-prong outlets. It's that your chances of being hurt rise sharply by doing so. Cheater plugs are meant to be grounded directly to a grounding screw or via a wire to say a rod stuck properly into the ground - clearly virtually no one using cheater plugs uses them correctly.

1. IEC Protection Class II......modern small appliances and other items, like you mentioned above, that have 2-prong plugs must be double insulated, usually have only plastic housings or plastic housings with metal parts that are very unlikely to become energized. Secondly, those appliances are made even safer on a GFCI circuit and on most modern homes they will be on GFCI circuits 95% of the time....kitchen, garage, bathroom, outside etc.

2. Ace Frehley the Kiss guitarist was nearly killed at a gig in Florida after a roadie used a cheater plug into an amplifier to stop a ground loop hum problem.
Ultimately Frehley's guitar became energized, he completed the circuit when the grabbed a metal rail its one hand and metal on his guitar (stings- pick-up whatever)

They wrote this song about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iauaDVVPGW8

I'm aware of the dangers, but I'm also aware of how much it costs to have the house rewired. It's simply not a consideration right now.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by BigDGeek

I'm aware of the dangers, but I'm also aware of how much it costs to have the house rewired. It's simply not a consideration right now.

Again the happy medium is to use GFCIs on all 110VAC circuits, total cost for most people would be less than $100, say $350 if you have an electrician do it. You'd get 95% of the safety of 3-prong/GFCI'd circuits at about 1 or 2% the cost of a rewiring job. Doing so has the blessing of all current NEC regs as well.

Also you can get, although it's a pro install only item in my opinion, GFCI circuit breakers if putting a GFCI plug along a circuit is problematic.

The only real drawback using a GFCI along a 2-prong/ungrounded circuit is GFCI testers won't work properly.

One of the semi-regulars here is an EE hopefully he will chime in.

A friend of mine is 40 yrs. experienced master electrician on vacation until later in the week I will ask him.

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by EDS_

Again the happy medium is to use GFCIs on all 110VAC circuits, total cost for most people would be less than $100, say $350 if you have an electrician do it. You'd get 95% of the safety of 3-prong/GFCI'd circuits at about 1 or 2% the cost of a rewiring job. Doing so has the blessing of all current NEC regs as well.

Also you can get, although it's a pro install only item in my opinion, GFCI circuit breakers if putting a GFCI plug along a circuit is problematic.

The only real drawback using a GFCI along a 2-prong/ungrounded circuit is GFCI testers won't work properly.

One of the semi-regulars here is an EE hopefully he will chime in.

A friend of mine is 40 yrs. experienced master electrician on vacation until later in the week I will ask him.

I actually thought about doing it that way but I didn't want every electrical outlet in the house to have an angry red sticker on it.

[Yellow pool of piddle]

Originally Posted by semidevil

we bought a home built in the 50's and the whole house has ungrounded 2 prong outlets, and a few faulty GFCI outlets.

If you had an older home, did you upgrade the electrical to ground all outlets, or did you leave it as is? any issues so far?


besides rewiring the house, is there a more affordable solution? I heard it's pretty expensive to rewire

Okay, I am going to think out loud. Do the older two prong electrical outlets predate the development of 220 volt appliances?

Electrical service today to cusomers is dictated by the huge motors used in factories and the three phase motors they utilize. On the telephone pole outside, there are three wires which are pushing and pulling current in alternating fashion. The transformers at the poles drop that down to alternating 220 going into the homes. This allows for either 110 or 220 volt service depending on how the wires are connected.

I am just thinking out loud here and I might be wrong.

At the fuse box, does your older home have 220 service? If so, was it later added on?

See, I am thinking they have always offered three phase and 220 to factories. They later began running 220 into homes as appliances were developed to utilize it. It is more economical.

This is similar to the standard car battery. Its internal structure is designed to deliver 100% of its amps to the starter. As other electrical devices were added later on, fuses anf elecrical breakers were added to step down the amps.

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by Yellow pool of piddle

...

Best username I've seen in a while.

[pharpe]

You can actually replace your breakers with GFCI breakers. That will add GFCI protection to the entire circuit and you do not have to touch the individual outlets.

Also, a GFCI outlet provides protection to all outlets downstream. So if you replace the first outlet in the circuit with a GFCI outlet than all the others have GFCI protection. The problem with this is figuring out which is the first outlet in the circuit can be difficult.

[hornraider]

Originally Posted by EDS_

Again the happy medium is to use GFCIs on all 110VAC circuits, total cost for most people would be less than $100, say $350 if you have an electrician do it. You'd get 95% of the safety of 3-prong/GFCI'd circuits at about 1 or 2% the cost of a rewiring job. Doing so has the blessing of all current NEC regs as well.

Also you can get, although it's a pro install only item in my opinion, GFCI circuit breakers if putting a GFCI plug along a circuit is problematic.

The only real drawback using a GFCI along a 2-prong/ungrounded circuit is GFCI testers won't work properly.

One of the semi-regulars here is an EE hopefully he will chime in.

A friend of mine is 40 yrs. experienced master electrician on vacation until later in the week I will ask him.

Thanks EDS, good advise already on this thread. The only things I might add to consider are:

1) a complete rewire job is more cost effective as a total gut job. It's a real PITA to replace wire in the walls without removing the sheetrock. Generally speaking, you should replace all the wiring if its very old (50yrs), have had structural damage (fire, water), have aluminum wires, or cloth insulated cables.
Or have any other problems with the electricity.

2) appliances should be grounded (3 prongs) because that ground wire is designed to protect you from being part of the circuit in case the neutral wire is broken or gets wet.
As mentioned above, 3 pronged outlets are useless unless 3 wire cable is ran to them (romex).

3) GFCI outlets are mandatory, per code, in wet locations (over countertops, garage, batrooms and outside. Gfci breakers can be used but arent that common anymore except for pools and hottubs.

Btw, don't use gfci receps for the fridge or washing machine, they frequently get a little wet and trip the very sensitive GFCI outlet. But I would definetly want those outlets grounded (3 prong) if nothing else for that reason.

Pm me if you want more specifics. Good luck

[arleigh]

If there is a breaker panel that will receive a GFI use it.
A lot of new appliances are supplied with 2 prong plugs including computers, lamps and so on.
High amperage stuff like microwaves and refrigerators and washing machines and dyers need 3 prong safety but ,I've lived for years in old homes with out the ground leg and every thing's fine .
One thing though, never put a breaker or fuse greater then the circuit is designed to handle. this is where fires are generated .
Once you've opened the door for professional work ,inspections will occur .
If the house has other issues, it is likely that they too will be noted, and subsequently need addressed.