Grounding Adapters

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iwire

iwire

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Was shopping at Lowe's on Saturday while working on the honey-do list.

Saw a bin load of these, just had to pick one up and share it.

3WAYCOOPER.jpg
3WAYLITESUN.jpg



3WAYCAUTION.jpg



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UL listed Current Tap?

Are these really listed?

Does Cooper really have anything to do with these?
 
Yeah, they're listed all right. The only type that were delisted are the type that had a little pigtail wire with a fork terminal on the end, where yours has a tab.

For some reason, Cooper makes most of the stuff that's just barely legal. They're doing it under their own name lately. They used to put their "Eagle" brand on all this marginal product.
 
Yeah I went searching UL after your first post, I was entirely surprised it was a legitimate number.

I thought the UL listing was removed from all of these.

A UL Listed grounding means eliminater.....who would have thunk it. :rolleyes:
 
iwire said:
A UL Listed grounding means eliminater.....who would have thunk it. :rolleyes:
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I guess you're only supposed to used these in 2-wire receptacles with a grounded box. That's a small portion of them. I wasn't aware that the cover plate screw was an acceptable EGC path, but the UL apparently thinks it works okay.
 
I a big fan of Litesun Industries products. I make sure that I always have an ample supply of Litesun products on hand. That an Shanghai ELE stuff tops my list of quality products.
 
mdshunk said:
Their company starts out with "Ningbo".
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I've noticed that on the Chinese made components that come with virtually every product these days, the first identifier is the name of the Chinese city where the factory or headquarters is located, such as the Shanghai ELE I just mentioned.

I just pulled my window AC out of the basement yesterday and I noticed the fan motor is made by the "Zhongshan Broad Ocean Motor Co Ltd." I'm not up on my Chinese geography but I checked Google and sure enough Zhongshan is in industrial Pearl River Delta in China.
 
mdshunk said:
I guess you're only supposed to used these in 2-wire receptacles with a grounded box. That's a small portion of them. I wasn't aware that the cover plate screw was an acceptable EGC path, but the UL apparently thinks it works okay.
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You think? I'd suspect it would be the larger portion of them.

Really old buildings installed with 2 wire devices are almost all metal boxes with BX (or conduit) feeds. Modern buildings of course already have 3 wire devices. That leaves the in between era with bakelite boxes or even metal boxes fed with a no ground NM product. How large a percentage of existing installs fall in that range?
 
BryanMD said:
Really old buildings installed with 2 wire devices are almost all metal boxes with BX
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That old BX (without the bonding strip) should not be considered a grounding means, it does carry current but when put under ground fault conditions it can heat red hot just like a stove heating element.

It is not a grounding means allowed under todays NEC and as far as I know never was. It was being installed at a time where receptacle and light fixture grounding was not required.
 
iwire said:
it does carry current but when put under ground fault conditions it can heat red hot just like a stove heating element.
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Has anyone actually seen this happen or know of a fire that was caused by non-bonded BX used for the grounding means?

I have no doubt this is true due to the high inductive reactance of the metal spirals. (hence the bonding strip in modern AC cable.) I always try to rip out as much of that old BX as possible because besides the poor grounding path, the insulation is usually dried out and falls right off the wire when you bend it.
 
peter d said:
Has anyone actually seen this happen or know of a fire that was caused by non-bonded BX used for the grounding means?
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I think Charlie E mentioned he knows of examples.

A GFCI breaker on the supply side is not a bad band aid for existing circuits.
 
iwire said:
3WAYCAUTION.jpg
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That statement molded into that thing assumes a lot about the circuit. Like that will actually make a ground connection? :-?

You titled this thread grounding adapters. Listed for grounding?

If so that would be a shocker. :wink:
 
peter d said:
Has anyone actually seen this happen or know of a fire that was caused by non-bonded BX used for the grounding means?
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The church I use to belong to called me one early evening on Halloween. They had set up a "scare house" for halloween in the basement of the church and saw a red glow in the ceiling. They told me over the phone that they thought it was a wire. I said to myself, yeah sure, but went anyway.

It was an old "BX" cable that had a short in the circuit. This cable was stapled on the bottom of the beam and ran across the whole church...the cable was glowing cherry red it's entire visible length.
I shut the circuit off and called the fire department. They scanned the walls and found no issues.

I have seen it occur on a smaller scale a couple of other times as well.
 
mdshunk said:
Yeah, they're listed all right. The only type that were delisted are the type that had a little pigtail wire with a fork terminal on the end, where yours has a tab......
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And this is the reason why:

GroundAdaptor.jpg


That pigtail can get into the hot side of a receptacle, essentially energized the ground of the cord plugged into it.

(Yea, I know... it's a grounded recep. I don't have any ungrounded ones to take a pix of.....sorry!)
 
480sparky said:
That pigtail can get into the hot side of a receptacle, essentially energized the ground of the cord plugged into it.

(Yea, I know... it's a grounded recep. I don't have any ungrounded ones to take a pix of.....sorry!)
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At first I thought that you dug this up out of your vast collection, but you staged it?!?! HEATHEN!

You bring any of those grounding adapters north of the 49th parallel and we string you up by the thumbs.

Pierre C Belarge said:
They had set up a "scare house" for halloween in the basement of the church and saw a red glow in the ceiling.
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A 'lectrician scare house? Cool...
 
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