Does the order matter of the wires when replacing a receptacle that's not a switched receptacle and still has the fin on? I'm replacing a receptacle at home and I lost track of the hot wires and neutral wires order. Not sure if the top neutral and bottom neutral got swapped and if the top hot got swapped with the bottom hot.
Replacing a receptacle question
- Thread starter cppoly
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- Placerville, CA, USA
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Electrically it makes no difference at all.
If both pairs of wires come out of the same conduit, the confusion about which ones form a pair (incoming versus outgoing) will just be passed along to the next guy to work on that box.
- Location
- Placerville, CA, USA
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- Retired PV System Designer
It would matter in terms of code compliance if the two halves are derived from different branches or if you removed the jumper fin on the neutral side too.
Or a couple of other odd situations involving the switch leg.
kwired
Electron manager
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- NE Nebraska
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The "fin" connects them together effectively making them the same potential - swap them back and forth all you want you will not see any performance changes until you have a loose connection for some reason - like wearing out the screw threads from repeatedly swapping them
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