How do you check if your plug outlet has a ground wire connected?

Question

I recently, tried to get U-verse and Internet offered by ATT, and they said they could not connect it until i got an electrician to come put ground wires in all the outlets in the home. The house is somewhat old, maybe built in early 1980's.

Is there an easy alternative to do this with out hiring an electrician? And how do i know if there is a wire that is not grounded if I took of the plate to check myself?

Answer 1

Will is right. A house built in the 80's should have wiring with a ground. If you have outlets with three holes in them ( two parallel slits with the left slightly larger than the right and a round one at the bottom ) then more than likely the ground wires were simply not attached. If you will take off the cover to your service panel, you should see all of the bare copper ground wires. If they are there and the system stills does not test as though there is an earth ground, your outside ground wire may have become detached. This is a piece of metal re bar with a clamp and a piece of copper wire attached to it. If the panel is in a basement, it may be grounded to the copper water pipes. If this is the case, look for a clamp on the closest water pipe which should also have a piece of copper wire attached.

Answer 2

You can buy a tester.

The cheapest and most user friendly looks like a plug with three lights on the back. Plug it into the outlet, and the pattern of light will tell you if your leads are reversed, if your ground is out, etc.

Answer 3

The tester mentioned previously is available at most big-box Home Centers like Lowe's & H-D, and is relatively economical.  It's the fastest way to test each outlet.  You should plug it into each one of the duplex receptacles (one above the other), as one could be wired correctly and the other one not.  I actually found that one receptacle of a pair was not grounded, while the other one was, due to a fault in the receptacle.

I'm quite surprised that your house is about 25 years old and your system is not grounded, as that has been part of the National Electrical Code for over 30 years.  My house is about 40 and has all grounded outlets.  A friend of mine had AT&T out to hook up U-verse; they spent 2.5 hours installing it, then 1.5 hours removing it, because they discovered they had no service in the area.  I have a U-verse box a block from my house, and all the lights are on inside (my son works for them & knows the system), but they insist that I don't have service anywhere near me.

If the U-verse tech told you your house electrical service is not grounded, invest in the tester before you hire an electrician.  He may be telling you that after discovering that you don't have the U-verse yet, either.

Answer 4

Both those previous answers are good ones, and I have that tester, and it's inexpensive to buy, and something good to have around the house.

My house was built in the fifties, and had no ground outlets. I have upgraded the Circuit panel and had that grounded. But it was too costly for the outlets to be grounded.

So I just did the job myself, although it meant going into the crawl space under the house. I ran some copper wiring from the outlets I needed grounding to the cold water pipe.

But that's not something I would recommend, for anyone, who isn't good with electrical outlets.

But check first. with the tester, I am sure that you are grounded.

Does your home, have the three pin outlets already? If it does, and not those two pin ones, then you have to be grounded.