Is this Safe

[dfpowe]

My friend have a old house, the plugs in this house is two prong but he want to switch all his plugs to three prongs.
This person who suppose to be a electrician stated to him, that he would not have to run new wire throught out the house, that he could run a ground wirer from each plug back to the ground of the box. I stated to my friend that, that do not sound right or safe.
Can someone please give me there opinion on this situation.

 

[charlie b]

I am not quite sure I understand what you mean by this:

. . . he could run a ground wire from each plug back to the ground of the box.

What box? If the box that houses a receptacle is metal, and if the conduit is metal, and if the metal conduit is continuous all the way back to the panel, and if the local codes do not prohibit you from using the conduit as a ground conductor, then I think it would be safe (and legal) to run a ground wire from the receptacle's ground screw to the box. But I am a bit out of my area here. Other opinions?

 

[mcclary's electrical]

I am not quite sure I understand what you mean by this:What box? If the box that houses a receptacle is metal, and if the conduit is metal, and if the metal conduit is continuous all the way back to the panel, and if the local codes do not prohibit you from using the conduit as a ground conductor, then I think it would be safe (and legal) to run a ground wire from the receptacle's ground screw to the box. But I am a bit out of my area here. Other opinions?

I read it the same way as you and recommend the same thing. However, If it's fed with NM, and no ground, the guys probably gonna pull a fast one and have useless grounds. We need to know the type of wiring to know if it's safe or not

 

[dfpowe]

The wire in the house now is old two wire (black and white wire with no ground)
I will check to see if the wire is in conduit.
The box i was talking about was the panel box (sorry about that).
But the boxes for the plugs or metal.

 

[wirenut601]

two wire receps

two wire receps

you may run one single ground wire from receptical back to the panel for a ground as long as local code allows this. that will alow newer grounded receps to be installed. if no ground wire is installed you can also put in a gfci and label it no equipment ground present as long as local code allows. if the recep is in a metal box and wired with two wire nm than taking a wire from the recep to the box will do nothing it has to get back to the panel.

 

[augie47]

Although permitted by 250.130(C), the most common method used locally is to install a GFCI means ahead of the receptacles in question and follow 406.3(D).

 

[charlie b]

If you are saying that the electrician wants to connect a wire to the receptacle, and run the wire back to the main panel, then that is definitely allowed, and is definitely safe.

 

[dfpowe]

I like to say thanks to all who replyed to my quesiton.
That's help alot. I just wanted to make sure that it was being done right and safe.

Thanks again.

dfpowe

 

[winnie]

IMHO if properly installed, this is legal, safe, and an extremely poor practise.

The labor for installing an EGC is pretty much equivalent to the labor for installing a new romex cable. You have less wire to pull, but you need to fish it into a box that is already occupied by an old cable, and you need to do this without damaging the old cable or its insulation. Meanwhile you are doing all of this labor to save some rather old cable, with insulation that is probably in fine shape as long as it is undisturbed. IMHO it would be a better job to either install new romex, or simply ignore the old circuits and pull new circuits where equipment needs the EGC.

Full disclosure: my comments above fall outside of my normal job related function, and are made from a DIY perspective.

-Jon

 

[tkb]

I agree with winnie.

If you are going to open the panel, replace the receptacle, and run new wire, you might as well run a new romex instead of a single wire.

In about the same amount of time you could be rewired with all new.