Electrical Repair for an Outlet Circuit
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I have one circuit in my house that appears not grounded on my plug-in circuit tester, although the electrician I called tells me that the hot to ground voltage is around 66 volts… |
Electrical Question from Gordon about Outlet Grounding Problem
Background: Gordon, a Homeowner from Los Angeles, CA
[ad#block]Question: I have one circuit in my house that appears not grounded on my plug-in circuit tester, although the electrician I called tells me that the hot/ground voltage is around 66 volts. He says there’s probably a ground wire that’s not tightly connected somewhere in the circuit, since the hot/ground at the breaker is 110 volts. Two questions:
1. Is there a gizmo that would allow me to track the wire from the breaker to the first box on the line without tearing out walls (all outlets appear to have the same problem)?
2. How dangerous is it to have only partial grounding for the circuit? Electrician wants to charge $1500 to find the problem, and that seems pretty steep to me.
I’ve done a bit of wiring, and I’m pretty sure I could fix the problem if I could locate the line, but wife will kill me if I go tearing up walls to find it. Any help will be much appreciated.
Additional Comments:
Dave’s Reply:
Thanks for your electrical question Gordon.
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The Following links will assist you with your electrical question:
For more information about Grounding
Electrical Grounding
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Do-It-Yourself Electrical
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Be Careful and Be Safe - Never Work on Energized Circuits!
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