Open Ground Question

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#1

Originally Posted By: kbowles
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I inspected a home yesterday that had a new panel installed and all new grounded recptacles. Everything looked fine in the panel box , all new 2 strand NM with ground. When I tested the receptacles throughout the home, they all had open grounds. I pulled a few covers of the receptacles and could not see a ground wire. Also there were no GFCI’s on the kitchen or exterior receptacles. I wrote this up and recommended a licensed electrician to come evaluate and clear problems. Am I missing something here or was a lot of work done only to not go the extra step to properly ground the receptacles? The bus in the panel was grounded correctly and all else was nice but I was just wondering why new wire with ground and so many open receptacles???


Kevin

--
Life's a journey, not a destination.
Aerosmith

#2

Originally Posted By: rmoore
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Sounds like an unfortunately common partial rewire job. New panel and exposed wiring…but when they get to the walls, they just connect to the old wiring (often incorrectly). As you said you didn’t see a ground in the boxes you opened, it doesn’t seem likely that the newer “romex” was run that far.


Ideal solution is to complete the rewiring all the way to the outlets. Very poor 2nd option is to replace the 3-prong with the original 2-prong outlets and/or GFCI's (marked "No Ground") where needed.

--
Richard Moore
Rest Assured Inspection Services
Seattle, WA
www.rainspect.com

#3

Originally Posted By: kbowles
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Thanks for your response Richard. I thought that might be the case but I just wanted to be sure so if the seller calls with questions. Since the access to the attic is to small for a midget to get through, much less my big butt, I could only inspect from the scuttle hole. But that was far enough to see that while they were doing the wiring, they ripped the HVAC ductwork to shreds. Oh well, there goes the sellers proceeds at closing! ( that damn inspector!) icon_wink.gif


Kevin

--
Life's a journey, not a destination.
Aerosmith

#4

Originally Posted By: dedwards
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Kevin,


I think you may have stated the reason why it wasn’t completed. The attic space was too small to work in. I too have found new Romex installed in a new panel and got the same indications at the recepticles. What they did was run the romex into the attic and to junction boxes they did a splice into the old two wire and snipped off the ground wires. It was a homeowner job and he got caught. He had a very red face too.