Message from @John Mackenzie

Discord ID: 369684615490699274


2017-10-16 18:10:59 UTC  

I can take care of the moisture problem easily enough

2017-10-16 19:13:07 UTC  

Yes I would go ahead and replace the breaker and the GFI outlet itself. You can get a 15 amp GFI outlet for about $13 and depending on the style of breaker it may be as the little as 5 or $8 to replace

2017-10-16 19:41:59 UTC  

@Deleted User make sure you go outside to where your meter is and disconnect the entire house before you open your panel.

2017-10-17 01:09:20 UTC  

@Deleted User So I tried to replace an outlet due to the plastic breaking on one of the receptacles. The new one is GFCI. The old one is decades old (possibly from the 50s) and the wires are from 1939 so I can barely see the white/black on the insulation. The outlet screws into a metal box, but it's loose in the wall (not totally detached, but loose) and I can't see if it's grounded to any pipes or what have you. There are no ground wires in the box. I wired the new outlet the same as the old: no power, LED unlit. I figured maybe the line/load was reversed so I switched them, now the LED lights up green but there's no power to the receptacles and it won't Reset. Is this thing just not grounded? Do I need to run a copper wire from the box to a pipe in the wall?

2017-10-17 01:10:02 UTC  

It's mid-series if that makes a difference

2017-10-17 02:47:05 UTC  

@John Mackenzie if you have a means of testing the circuit you can test from each conductor to the metal box and see if one of them has voltage. If it is an old metal clad cable called BX the shielding may be grounded. They do not intend for the shield to provide a ground for the receptacle though. On a GFCI receptacle polarity does matter. The energized conductor needs to go to the hot side which will have a gold screw. The GFI also has terminals marked line and load. To feed receptacle you use the ones marked line. The outlet will work properly with just a hot and a neutral attached. It does not have to have a ground. There is a code ruling which says you can replace an old two prong outlet with a GFI outlet without having to provide a ground to it because the GFI is a safety feature

2017-10-17 02:49:31 UTC  

Hm.. I thought it had to be grounded or it would trip

2017-10-17 02:49:58 UTC  

Ok then I'm at a loss for what's wrong, I put the old one back in and it works fine

2017-10-17 02:51:21 UTC  

I put the power to the gold screws and neutral to silver screws

2017-10-17 02:52:04 UTC  

And I swapped them when I thought I mixed up line and load, but it didn't work either way

2017-10-17 02:56:41 UTC  

The hot wire goes on the gold screw the white wire goes on the silver screw. The silver screw is for the neutral. Both of these two wires will go on the upper portion of the outlet marked line. How many wires total are you working with two or four

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/322712495108128779/369680088003903508/20171016_225756.jpg

2017-10-17 02:58:36 UTC  

Four

2017-10-17 03:00:54 UTC  

One pair of wires meaning a black and white are the feed circuit coming in. These will have to go to the terminals marked line. The other two wires can go in the load terminals. If you had the hot wire landed properly but had the wrong neutral paired with it the light may work but the outlet will not function properly. You will have to get the hot and neutral paired correctly

2017-10-17 03:02:05 UTC  

Hopefully you can just look at the box ifthe cables come in in separate connectors it's easy to see which two are a pair

2017-10-17 03:02:49 UTC  

They don't, they all come in separately lol, I tried to look back behind the box but I can't see

2017-10-17 03:04:35 UTC  

Can you take a picture of the box and send it to me

2017-10-17 03:05:18 UTC  

It's at my mom's house, I'll stop by after work tomorrow and take a pic

2017-10-17 03:07:33 UTC  

And if you can try to take some type of a tester with you even if it is just a small hand-held light. test light. What it is is you had a hot and neutral come into the Box and feed the outlet and then a pair of wires going out to another load Downstream. You have to identify that pair that it's coming in live. With a test light you should be able to test cross the wires until you find the two that read hot. That should be your hot and your neutral that you would put on the line side.

2017-10-17 03:08:28 UTC  

But if you have some small tester like that I could talk you through it easy enough

2017-10-17 03:13:27 UTC  

Isn't that weird though that it works fine with the old outlet, and after installing the new one in one configuration I swapped the positions of the black wires w/each other and the positions of the white wires w/each other, and it didn't work in either configuration? Then I reinstalled the old outlet and it works fine? Even if I mixed up line and load, I swapped it and still got nothing.

2017-10-17 03:14:40 UTC  

Eh I'll grab a test light and report back tomorrow

2017-10-17 03:22:31 UTC  

Yes I can get confusing when they're not marked properly. You just have to get the hot black wire with the correct white wire. On A regular outlet it does not have the line and load options that the GFI does. In that scenario you just have to get the blacks on one side and the whites on the other

2017-10-17 07:58:12 UTC  

Huh huh huh

2017-10-17 07:58:22 UTC  

Good one Greg

2017-10-31 16:04:48 UTC  

Watching other guys work all day sure is exhausting

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/322712495108128779/374951853466845184/IMG_20171031_113300232.jpg

2017-10-31 16:13:17 UTC  

Grab a shovel bro, plenty of work to do! 😆 😆

2017-10-31 16:13:55 UTC  

It's cold today, I didn't dress properly.

2017-10-31 16:25:34 UTC  

Fam, I'm a big bad heavy machinery operator. I'm too good to associate with those dirty plebians.

2017-10-31 17:23:45 UTC  

Haha

2017-10-31 19:01:54 UTC  

@John O - you're going to get fat haha.

2017-10-31 19:02:33 UTC  

I need it, man, I'm skinny as hell

2017-10-31 19:03:07 UTC  

You're right though, every professional operator I've seen was 300+lbs

2017-10-31 19:06:21 UTC  

😂 I need it too, I've worked my ass off, literally. I was so stoked on Sunday, I just broke 150lbs😆

2017-10-31 19:08:36 UTC  

Sheeeiiiit

2017-10-31 19:09:13 UTC  

You work outside? I thought you did custom stairwells and shit

2017-10-31 19:12:19 UTC  

I do historic preservation in general, I work inside and out. Even doing windows I'm in and out, painters caulk and paint windows shut, almost like they don't know windows are suppose to open.

2017-10-31 19:12:49 UTC  

Usually with windows I spend the first 4 hours of the day outside.

2017-11-11 04:47:00 UTC  

Hey if I have a question ... who do I @?

2017-11-11 04:50:18 UTC  

@John O -#7072

2017-11-11 12:15:40 UTC  
2017-11-11 12:25:06 UTC  

@Deleted User did you get your problem taken care of