A Little Heads Up On Wall Outlets

[BrotherBart]

For a long time I have known that when I have an oil filled space heater running on "medium" in the family room two of the other outlets on the circuit in the room get warm. Thought it was normal. Last night I was doing the annual test of heating with just the oil filleds in the house on a cold night.

I walked over to those two outlets and they were HOT. I grabbed the IR thermo and one of them was 107 degrees. This is an outlet on an outside wall on a 20 degree night. I unplugged the heater from the other outlet on the circuit. 30 minutes later the suspicious outlet was still at a hundred degrees. I popped the breaker on the circuit and contemplated a bit and went to bed.

This morning I pulled the hottest outlet. It was a "backstabbed" install where the wires are punched down into the back rather that attached with the screws on the sides. As obviously all of the outlets in the place are. A little visit to Google produced the info that the things are notorious for overheating and causing fires due to poor connections. I replaced that outlet and now it has been 55 degrees all day.

A good idea would be to use that IR gun that is so much fun to use to check the wood stove temp to check the outlets in your house. These were installed 30 years ago this month and heaven only knows how long that one has been getting ready to make us homeless.

 

[seige101]

Great advice BrotherBart! I think backstabbing is hack and they should make a code change to outlaw it. Making a fish hook connection on the screws is great. The best way is to make a proper pig tail of all the wires in the box and a small tail leading to the device it self.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

Glad all turned out okay.

+1 to seige101 as well.

 

[heat seeker]

Great heads-up!

Those back stabber connections have very little contact area and even less contact pressure, thus heat up and corrode, which makes the situation even worse. The screw connections give the most contact area with great contact force. I won't use the backstabbers ever.

 

[fbelec]

way to go bb. i get calls about the same thing or that some outlets are not working at all. the worst ones are the old leviton brand. when they keep getting hot cold hot cold the plastic face just breaks off and leaves the prongs showing for a good scare. if you haven't done it already redo the rest in your house. sometimes when i get there on a call for no power the wire has melted the insulation off and has gotten the copper so hot it is discolored at the least and breaks the moment i pull the outlet out of the box. the metal box usually grounds it out for a blown fuse or breaker but if you have plastic boxes it's a race on if the wire melts itself to the ground wire for the short or the glowing wire touches the wood stud. i fired a guy for using backstabs.

frank

 

[BrotherBart]

Yep. These are Levitons. Got a lot of work to do now. Starting with the dead outlet upstairs.

 

[BrotherBart]

way to go bb. i get calls about the same thing or that some outlets are not working at all. the worst ones are the old leviton brand. when they keep getting hot cold hot cold the plastic face just breaks off and leaves the prongs showing for a good scare. if you haven't done it already redo the rest in your house. sometimes when i get there on a call for no power the wire has melted the insulation off and has gotten the copper so hot it is discolored at the least and breaks the moment i pull the outlet out of the box. the metal box usually grounds it out for a blown fuse or breaker but if you have plastic boxes it's a race on if the wire melts itself to the ground wire for the short or the glowing wire touches the wood stud. i fired a guy for using backstabs.

frank

Will it be OK to just unstab'em and use the screws on the old outlets?

 

[seige101]

I would not bother trying to use them. If they are that old the tabs that grab the prongs on whatever you plug in are probably starting to show their age and not grab a plug with as good of a connection anymore. New ones are only $.50 each why take the risk?

 

[BrotherBart]

Most have never had anything plugged into them. But I will go new while I am at it. Though I don't get'em for fifty cents like the pros do.

Thanks.

The only thing I know about electricity is to not lick the wires.

 

[Rossco]

What's a 'Backstabbed' connection like?

 

[BrotherBart]

There are holes in the back of the outlet. You push down a tab through a hole and then push the wire in and let go and it gets clamped. Gotta be fast for installing a house full of outlets during construction rather than bending wire and tightening screws.

 

[TMonter]

That is one of the first things I did with our house when we purchased it was replace all the back-wired outlets with cooper units that use the newer pinch type screw connections that are really easy to wire.

I'd also recommend one of these to test to make sure your outlets are wired and grounded properly. Never hurts to check.

http://www.homedepot.com/s/outlet%20tester?NCNI-5

I've had the cheap Klein one for 10+ years and it's still kicking.

 

[Rossco]

There are holes in the back of the outlet. You push down a tab through a hole and then push the wire in and let go and it gets clamped. Gotta be fast for installing a house full of outlets during construction rather than bending wire and tightening screws.

Yeah for sure. I erm 'Googled' it just after I posted

Looked like a good idea for around 30 seconds until I seen pictures of burnt receptacles.

Awesome.

I recently replaced a few sockets in the kids rooms with Giffys. Didnt seen and backstabbers.

 

[TMonter]

Great advice BrotherBart! I think backstabbing is hack and they should make a code change to outlaw it. Making a fish hook connection on the screws is great. The best way is to make a proper pig tail of all the wires in the box and a small tail leading to the device it self.

What is the benefit of a pigtail over wiring directly into the receptacle? Is there a specific instance where this should be used?

 

[seige101]

What is the benefit of a pigtail over wiring directly into the receptacle? Is there a specific instance where this should be used?

You are relying on the little scored metal tab on the receptacle to handle all the current in the circuit. Pretty much all outlets are daisy chained so the current or load passes through each outlet on the circuit. You can kinda see what i am talking about in this picture

You see the little brass tab between the screws. It's designed so you can essentially split the outlet in 2. Either to use 2 different circuits on the outlet or to switch half the outlet.

 

[moey]

Be glad you didnt have it running on 1500w..

 

[firefighterjake]

I cannot think of a single electrician that I have spoken to that has ever thought the backstabbed connections is a good idea on new or renovation projects . . . not with their reputation and liability issues on the line.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

Black to gold.
Get a good pair of something (I have a pair of needle nose pliers that work perfectly) to put the fish hook bend on the wire with.
Otherwise you'll be loosing patience before you get to the second one.

 

[firefighterjake]

Black Gold is a good thing.
The Lone Ranger wore White and rode Silver.

 

[spirilis]

Wow, definitely the first time I've heard of concrete evidence for not using them. (I never use them, but found a couple outlets in my house with them...)
I can't imagine anything would go bad with just moving the wires over to the screw terminals. Maybe sand the copper a tad in case there's oxidation on the wires.

 

[Warm_in_NH]

They're cheap, they handle electricity, they can and will fail eventually, when they fail it can be problematic, if you've got to disconnect and reconnect everything it only makes sense to replace them while you're at it.
Had a 4 year old GFI in my kitchen "fail" this summer while the vacuum was plugged into an outlet downstream of it. Sounded like a transformer shorting out, I heard the buzz of the electricity over the sound of the vacuum right before it went "bang" and emitted a puff of stinky smoke.

 

[heat seeker]

Black to Brass, Green to Ground.

 

[Highbeam]

There is another option not yet mentioned that is more expensive than the backstab or the sidewire. It's a backwire outlet. Usually the medium price outlets. I think they are superior to the hook and screw because you don't have to worry about proper hooking without insulation under the screw. How they work is you shove the straight, stripped wire into the back of the outlet and then tighten the sidescrew which clamps down on the wire. It's a big clamp not unlike the method used to hold the wire to the circuit breaker at the panel.

I first ran into these with GFCI outlets and loved the concept. Way more foolproof than the sidehook or the backstab.

 

[Highbeam]

Here's some photos. They are not 5$ per outlet. You can buy them bulk at home depot. I find that the plug is less distorted than when I use a sidewire and tighten the hell out of the screws.

http://www.handymanhowto.com/electrical-outlets-side-wire-versus-back-wire/

 

[Ncountry]

Absolutely, what Highbeam said.. You will thank him for the advice later .. For me as a builder I find it worth the extra $ for the backwired ones (screw and clamp type). A lot easier(quicker) than messing with curling the wires around etc... This is especially true in a box that has already been wired. Often there is not a lot of extra wire to work with...