What did I just do, and why did it work? (home wiring content)

I wanted to re-do some electrical outlets in my house to neaten-up/simplify the job some professional electricians did. 

The long and short is they tied in to a non-grounded line, and in the new outlet, the common (white) is jumpered over to the ground. Like so:

Afterwards, I tested it with my handy dandy 3 light home inspector's outlet tester, and everything was correct.

This must be a work around for adding grounded circuits to ungrounded systems, but I simply don't understand why this is okay. 

I copied what I took out, so all is well, but I'd appreciate an explanation. I thought this was wrong.

Semi-related note: something that kind of sucks is when you re-do a professionals work, and there is an intermittent problem that you trace back to find a loose connection in their work. 16 grand for the wiring job. Am I wrong to expect work better than I'd do?

You’re not wrong about redoing the loose connection part, that shouldn’t happen.  I spent a couple of hours a while back pulling the outlets and switches out in our addition to eliminate the back stab terminations (the strip /jam it in the back of the receptacle things) and terminating everything on the screws.   It’s a me thing, my Dad taught me not to use them so there we are.   Electricians use them because it’s fast, I can terminate an outlet in under 5 minutes the old school way, know that it’s tight and sleep better.  Again it’s a me thing.  Maybe they’re just as good as screws, maybe they’re not   

Jumping the neutral with the ground works because in the main panel the neutral is bonded to the ground by the buss bars in the panel.     I’m not licensed / well enough versed in the NEC to tell you it’s allowable to do that outside the panel but that’s why it works.  

In reply to 11GTCS :

So, common is grounded?

Can't you still get shocked if you grab the common? (note, I didn't try. I shock myself enough without trying to.

The ground and the neutral buss bars are tied together in the panel. A cheaty way of installing a grounded outlet in a ungrounded house is to jumper the neutral to the ground. 

The neutral will almost never shock you unless you have a circuit with florescent lighting in it. The old potted ballasts will bleed voltage into the neutral on occasion.

Learning is fun. Thanks, Guys!

In general, connecting the common and ground anywhere but the bus bar in the panel is a bad idea.  There is too much risk of reversed polarity somewhere else in the house which means that it's possible for a neutral/ground to then have 120v.  It can also induce some crazy phantom voltage.  My old house kept tripping the GCFI in the bathroom and I discovered it had 94v phantom.  That took a while to track down.  In my case it was because one of the three-way lights on the same circuit had a reversed polarity and was messing things up.

What I do is to ignore the ground wire but label any of the j-boxes "no ground." for future prevention of death.  My current house has plenty of 2-conductor cloth romex with no ground that was distributed upstream with new romex that has a ground.  If someone opens up a box and sees modern romex with ground and they test voltage to ground, they'll get zero which is a false indicator.  I intentionally A) connect the ground wires in those downstream boxes so I don't have to do it later, and B) physically label the ground in those boxes with that says "no ground" on some tape.

That's terrible IMO. It would be better to leave things ungrounded.  If the neutral connection upstream (between the fuse/breaker box and this outlet) opens up,  and there's a device drawing current plugged into one of the outlets, both the neutral and the ground are going be at an elevated voltage, which potentially means that even a perfectly functional device with a three prong plug and a metal case plugged into one of the pseudo-grounded outlets could have the case be "hot" - a legit shock hazard. 

With my laymans understanding of electrical systems, I cannot come up with a single reason that this is better than leaving it ungrounded...   I thought the purpose of a ground was to have a fallover leg in case things go really sideways, there's still a path that the magic pixies can get out from that doesn't involve the human since they're lazy and follow the path of least resistance.  In this case, the ground is literally the same path as the neutral, so it's not going to be the path of least resistance any more than the neutral already was, which means the pink fleshy-bit with a fork jammed in the outlet is now probably the path of least resistance.

Is my understanding incorrect?

Electrician here:

What was done is a code violation and can lead to a shock and fire hazard.

If a 3 prong 120V outlet is required on an ungrounded circuit a GFCI receptacle is required. Making a ground from the nuetral is illegal.

In reply to pjbgravely :

Thanks for that.

Let me give some back story: 75 year old house undergoing a diy restoration. Link

In talking to codes, they said NO new wire was to be downstream of old wire. This, along with simple exhaustion was a major factor in my paying the professionals to do the job. They fell partially through the ceiling in a couple of places, and did several things that I found questionable, yet codes passed them no prob. I suspect my little jumper wire thing is simply a way to get the home inspection light thingie to show that the outlet is correct.

Now, were a person interested in doing this correctly (like I am), running a separate ground would be a good solution, right? It's easy enough to do.

That's totally illegal and unsafe.

That should have been a 2 prong outlet. 

The ground leg is supposed to provide an alternate direct path to ground.

The problem with what was done there is that although the the ground leg does return to the panel (through the neutral), it has a shorter path to every neutral in the house prior to getting the panel.  Ground won't return to ground.  It will return to the neutral side of any appliance in the house.

Connecting the white wire to the green terminal is a NEC violation.

There is no scenario where this is OK. It did not work, it just looks like it did.

If you are following code and not using new wire downstream from old wire this should not be an issue.

Something that can be done legally is to install a GFCI receptacle and then mark it with an 'ungrounded receptacle' sticker (they are usually included in the box when you buy them.)

wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) said:

In reply to pjbgravely :

Thanks for that.

Let me give some back story: 75 year old house undergoing a diy restoration. Link

In talking to codes, they said NO new wire was to be downstream of old wire. This, along with simple exhaustion was a major factor in my paying the professionals to do the job. They fell partially through the ceiling in a couple of places, and did several things that I found questionable, yet codes passed them no prob. I suspect my little jumper wire thing is simply a way to get the home inspection light thingie to show that the outlet is correct.

Now, were a person interested in doing this correctly (like I am), running a separate ground would be a good solution, right? It's easy enough to do.

The way to do it is to use 2 prong 120V receptacles or GFCI receptacles. The GFCI are more costly but you only need one per circuit, and use normal 3 prong outlets on the rest. Alternately you can use GFCI breakers on all affected circuits. Either way all of the illegal jumpers need to removed for the GFCIs to protect properly. I believe the 2020 NEC requires all circuits in a house to be arc fault or GFCI protected. 

These electritians were not professionals in any way.

wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) said:

 

Now, were a person interested in doing this correctly (like I am), running a separate ground would be a good solution, right? It's easy enough to do.

Here's my issue with running a separate ground...

If you pull a single strand wire, no matter what you do, it will look out of place.  Any future people working on the system will assume it is a CATV line, or an old analog phone line.  (I'm not sure what the code would say about this).

The way to do it is to pull a new 12/2 with ground from the panel to the first outlet with 2 conductors in the circuit, then eliminate the 2 conductor stuff.

In a house that age, you should also be on the lookout for aluminum wire.

How long ago was this work done?

The electrician was clueless (and charged you a butt load of money), but the inspector blew it too.  I would be reporting that to code enforcement.

In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :

Answer: October 2019.

Okay, so a single strand ground looks out if place, but is it safe? I've got maybe 5' to run.

Nevermind, as I type this, I realize I can simply go into the box and run new 3 wire from the box.

All help appreciated, guys.

In reply to wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) :

That's the right answer. 
 

But the answer to your question... 

It would be ELECTRICALLY safe the run a separate ground. But the job of an electrician is to keep it safe for future users and workers who know nothing about how it's been previously modified. If a future electrician or homeowner can't figure out what is going on, then it's less safe. 

In reply to wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) :

Even though some time has passed, I'd still be inclined to report this to Code Enforcement.  They will have records of who inspected it, and should be aware there was an oversight like this. 

I forgot to mention that I don't believe a separate ground wire outside of the original circuit is legal. I don't know the specific code but I may look it up today.

Cool. Thanks everybody. I'll run new wire, and just be done with it.

Svrex; I'm afraid turning in the electrical inspector will end badly for me. Small town, only three inspectors (plumbing, electrical, structural). I'll just take my lumps. The project still has a long way to go, and that leniency is a dual edged sword. Advice appreciated. 

In reply to wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) :

I don't think leniency with electrical safety is an opportunity.  You WANT an inspector who knows his E36 M3. What's wrong with failing an inspection if something is done poorly?
 

I wasn't suggesting it for you. I was suggesting it for the safety of everyone in the community. 
 

There are nice ways to do it that don't have to be adversarial. 

...and honestly if this electrician is a pro, it's important to bring it to the inspector's attention. 
 

It's not a big deal for an inspector to miss something. It's a very big deal to have a "pro" who doesn't know any better and does this kind of work for everyone. 
 

Code enforcement specifically told you no new wiring downstream from the old ungrounded. He blew that off.

If this electrician has issues, it's the inspector's job to report him to the state licensing authority. If no one reports the shoddy work to the inspector, then the electrician never improves and it becomes an issue for everyone until someone gets hurt. 

Funny thing about those outlet testers is in a certain situation they can show correct wiring even if it's a hot ground. I went out to assist another tech when I was still at DTV after he couldn't figure out how TVs and STBs were blowing up every time you plugged them in and connected our grounded cable line to the box.  Turns out the ground plug of that outlet was hot but the three light tester said it was good.

https://www.ecmweb.com/construction/article/20897728/failures-in-outlet-testing-exposed