Outlets wired in parallel

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Tim M

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I'm looking at a situation in a business office that we're renovating. We found the existing outlets were ungrounded. We talked with the client and they don't have the money to re-wire the building so we are using 406.3 to provide them with standard outlets. The method we are using is find the first outlet, change it to a GFI label it and place standard outlets downstream and label appropriately. When we started in on this, we found that the original building has the separate rooms wired in parallel. Obviously, I can put GFI's in every outlet, but has anyone run across this before and is this gonna make the GFI's intolerable in tripping depending on the load in the various outlets?
 

allenwayne

Senior Member
Kind of vauge how many receptacle outlets are you talking about?How many circuits are there.Why all the gfci devices?Manufacturer decides how many downstream devices are allowed NEC does not address this.
 
All receptacle outlets if wired properly are in parallel.I don't understand your question.The only series connection is through the gfci.
Paul
 

charlie b

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Staff member
Location
Lockport, IL
Occupation
Retired Electrical Engineer
bassphisher said:
The only series connection is through the gfci.
Actually, that is in parallel too. To be clear, I mean that any load plugged into the gfci receptacle will be in parallel with any load plugged into a downstream receptacle. There is a switch internal to the gfci device, and that switch is in series with the gfci receptacle, and is thus in series with everything downstream.
 

chicar

Senior Member
Location
Lancaster,Pa
Because this electrical system does not have any means to bond electrical equipment, I would say rewire. If not,I would replace with new nongrounded recepticals. Install gfi only where you need a three prong outlet. :D
 

Tim M

Member
Jim W in Tampa said:
They are gonna be calling you when 6 computers go down because 1 triped a gfci.Would prefer device at every outlet but yes that does cost.
And that is exactly what we're concerned about. As I stated in the original post, the client doesn't have the money to re-wire. We were using the GFI's based upon Article 406.3(D). What my question boils down to is what (if any) other methods do we have to offer them a 3 pronged outlet? As you see in my reply above, the conduit is rigid and we tested it for ground but it's only 14 ohms. I recall (but can't pull up the text) to say that we need 25 ohms for a good ground. If that isn't the case, we could bond to the boxes (they are metal). We just weren't sure and thus the original post.
 

Tim M

Member
bassphisher said:
All receptacle outlets if wired properly are in parallel.I don't understand your question.The only series connection is through the gfci.
Paul
To clear this up may need a diagram but let me try. From the panel, we see hot and neutral leave and arrive at the box. Say there are 4 receptacles in the office. To the hot & neutral coming in to the first box, we have 4 wires attached to the hot and 4 wires attached to the neutral and each one of these sets goes to one outlet. That's the way the electrician described it to me.
 

peteo

Senior Member
Location
Los Angeles
Welcome to the forum, Tim. I'll try to save words, is why this will look presumptuous. I'm just considering if it were to be my own offices, and trying to save on installation costs.

You mentioned 14 ohms. Was this a ground rod test? If so, it's okay because you need LESS than 25 ohms. In theory, the steel in ground rods deteriorate with time and can be added to with a new one, bonded to the first, per 250.56. This is the 'ground' from the grounding strip at the service entrance. If the 14 ohms you mentioned means a metal box back to the panel along rigid pipe, it sounds as if the serrated washers need to be knocked back in before proceeding.

What you want to get for your customer is performance. If the wiring has been done in rigid pipe, you have an acceptable grounding path installed; what am I missing here? The GFCI is there for personal protection, not for clearing faults. My 2002 NEC handbook has a photo inside the front cover "bonding jumper not required" and attaching receptacle ground to metal box pictures in 250.8. My neighborhood was wired this way in 1947 using steel flex as a ground conductor and I haven't heard of any problems.

The way to test the wiring is by performing a high pot test. Done properly, this will test the conductors and the ground path back to the panel. Better value for money than adding in appliances which would mask actual wiring problems, and it should be done anyway every ten years or when this type of wire is being worked with. This is the final check, even when using new wire.

If someone gets a warmer fuzzier feeling from 6 mA ground fault protection (not a bad idea, in my opinion) then by all means either find GF breakers or replace the first receptacle on the branch with a GFCI unit as Charlie pointed out. I've used GFCI receptacles with wiped out old power tools, outdoors, in bathrooms, etc. Each printer, copier, etc., does contribute to small leakage currents to ground, but there's no reason to expect any nightmare service calls because of them.
 

Jim W in Tampa

Senior Member
Location
Tampa Florida
How did you measure this 14 ohms ? What is it that you think a gfci receptacle will do ? Yes it permits the ground prong but that is not offering equipment grounding.Personally i think you need a more qualified electrician out there.Your going to have to replace every receptacle anyways so labor is the same as if you install gfci recepts at every outlet.What you might run into is boxes not big enough for number of wires and device.Also you did not mention any shared neutrals.Customer seems able to afford your services and price of an electrician,will an extra $10 cause a huge problem ? When a cubical goes down they likely lost far more than $10
 

iwire

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Massachusetts
Tim

Check out 250.114. :!:

Just because you install a grounding outlet per 406.3 does not mean the customer can now plug equipment that needs a grounding means into that replacement outlet.
 

pierre

Senior Member
Tim
If you have an existing installation using Rigid conduit, that meets 250.118(2), which is an acceptable means of equipment grounding.
I am curious as to how you measured the 14 ohms on the rigid.

I am not there to take a peek at this situation, but from your explanation, it seems you do have an equipment ground.
 

busman

Senior Member
Location
Northern Virginia
Occupation
Master Electrician / Electrical Engineer
The GFCI does not detect the current flowing to ground. Instead, it tracks the current flowing in the hot and neutral and assumes that if they are the same, then there is no leakage to ground. When the 2 current levels differ by 6 ma, it trips.

Mark

(edited for spelling)
 

George Stolz

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Windsor, CO NEC: 2017
Occupation
Service Manager
peteo said:
You mentioned 14 ohms. Was this a ground rod test? If so, it's okay because you need LESS than 25 ohms.
That's not correct. There is no requirement for a grounding electrode system to have less than 25 ohms resistance to the earth.

I never understood how a GFCI could detect a ground fault if there is no ground.
The neutral of a circuit carries as much current as the hot conductor when a load is connected.

Imagine that you are the GFCI. Imagine that current is money. Your right hand is handing a dollar to the load in front of you, the load hides it for a second, and then returns the dollar back into your left hand. As you keep handing the load money, you're watching how much you're giving it, because you want it back.

So, in essence, when the load hands you 96? on the neutral, you quit loaning it money.

So, when the 4mA is lost between giving current out and getting it back, the GFCI trips. The grounding conductor had nothing to do with the transaction. :)

Hope that weird analogy helped, somehow.
 

ramdiesel3500

Senior Member
Location
Bloomington IN
Aftershock
A gfci does not need a ground connection to function. It has, basically, a pair of circuit transformers in it. One of the transformers measures the current flow through the "hot" (black) conductor. The other transformer measures the current flow through the "grounded/neutral" (white) conductor. So long as the current through each conductor is equal to the current through other within 5 milliamps, then fine. But if the imbalance is more than 5 ma, then this means that more than 5 ma worth of current flow is escaping the normal wiring path. When this happens, that pair of CT's will signal the device to trip. In most cases the "escaping" current would flow through the ground conductor back to the source, but it does not have to. All the receptacle does is check to be sure all current is flowing "in and out" in the same quanitities. If so, then there is no "leak"!
 

haskindm

Senior Member
Location
Maryland
A GFCI measures the amount of current traveling on the ungrounded conductor and compares it to the current returning on the grounded conductor. When the difference in these two currents exceeds a certain amount (7ma for example) the GFCI will open. This is over-simplification, but should give you the idea. The grounding conductor is not needed for the GFCI to operate.
 
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