Why pigtail receptacle

Also, I prefer using the deepest boxes that will fit. This ensures lots of spare room as well as room for future expansion. Why struggle trying to jam it all in? My personal experience. I plugged in a radiant heater into a 20A receptacle in my garage. It ran for about 3 hours before the breaker tripped. Also a burnt plastic melt smell. The entire garage was dead. I did a LFS Look for stuff and noticed the receptacle that the garage door was plugged into had a black soot color coming from under the receptacle cover.

I had a very hard time removing the plug from the receptacle as it was melted into the socket. After removing the cover plate I noticed the receptacle was half melted. Remember the heater was not plugged into this ceiling receptacle. It was plugged into a GFCI on the wall. Further checking found the hot black wire insulation melted and was shorted to the ground bare wire. Did notice screw loose connecting the black wire to receptacle when I removed it.

To me this is the main reason for using pig tails on all recptacles. This is a new home built in 08' or 09'. We are 1st owners. Also the bedrooms have special GFCI breakers. They have all tripped at one time or another. I plan to redo all receptacle outlets with pigtails because of this possible fire I almost had. So you have seen tab failures, along with nut failures? In the 30 years I've been in the industry I've known no other way than to pigtail.

If a neutral tab was to break, the outlets downstream from it would go unaffected with pigtailed outlets. In Australia and New Zealand, outlets are what Americans call "back wired".

The holes have room for two or more wires to be looped through. Wires must be twisted together. In wall power wires can be stranded or solid, but the earth must be stranded. UK sockets are on "ring main", so every socket is expected to have wires feeding into and out of it from both directions. In the UK, it is common to put up to 3 wires into the same screw terminal; I have never seen pigtails being used to avoid putting 2 wires into a screw terminal. Maybe the screw terminals we have are better able to cope with multiply wires in them.

I wan't able to find installation instructions from any of the major receptacle manufacturers. Though I was able to find this video from Leviton a major manufacturer of electrical devices, in the United States.

The video demonstrates how to install a receptacle there's also a version on YouTube , and clearly shows the installer using both sets of terminals to make the connections. To me, both methods have 2 connections that can fail. If properly done, they will most likely have the same probability of failing with terminals being higher in earthquake prone areas.

I have never seen a pigtail of wires in a box with a receptacle. The outlet is always used to tie lines together. I think the advantage is reliability. Having been a certified electrician in california for 10 years, the first thing they teach you in a union apprenticeship is that pigtails save you on future call backs. The reasoning is this, most receptacles are only rated for 15AMP, and wirenuts are rated for at least 20 on yellows, or greys and probably 30 on reds. So your passthrough is the same as the wire itself.

Receptacles are a weak point, meaning that they get torqued, and slammed and pulled. You don't want that to be your splice point. You want your splice on wirenuts, many times receptacles have razor blade stab in's which work well in a time pinch, but not when you are relying on them to carry 20 AMPs to the next 5 receptacles.

If you do use receptacle screws, Don't use the stab in holes at least. One method is the feed-through: uses the receptacle to carry on the circuit elsewhere and the receptacle must be designed to do so note that not all receptacles allow feed-through , the other method is the pigtail one: wires are twisted inside a wire nut.

They are both equally safe if done properly. Regarding the codes: that changes from country to country, for example in North America and UK the use of wirenuts marrettes is common but in other European countries marrettes aren't approved.

Depending on the country one is in, electrical components are built and tested differently, rules and practices are different my personal experience is with Canada and Italy for example.

Obviously one follows the code that applies to them and inspectors will require whats fitting to the code according to them and their experience. Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top.

Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams? Learn more. When wiring outlets should I use pigtails or both sets of outlet screws? Ask Question. Asked 9 years, 4 months ago. Active 2 years, 6 months ago.

Viewed k times. Improve this question. Tester k 73 73 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. DA01 DA01 In past homes, that was always done via pigtailing. Add a comment. Active Oldest Votes.

Improve this answer. Well, I've only owned one home prior to this, so I suppose the person that did that one just preferred the pig tail option. Agreed, it's just easier when you're going around the room to wire up the 'north' and 'south' sides of outlets — Aaron.

The electrical inspector told me that pig tails are required. So my receptacles all have pig tails — Craig. Craig Pigtailing is definitely the recommended practice, but I don't think it's required by code. Craig, pigtails are required on MWBCs always, so if you have those, that might be why. Or it might be a local code amendment. Show 1 more comment. Like I said, this is not a wiring method that you're likely to find in a home. Rand Rand 4 4 silver badges 7 7 bronze badges.

It's actually a wiring method that's extremely common in a home's kitchen countertop outlets, to provide the required 2 20 amp circuits. Go ahead and strip the end of your new pigtail wires to make fresh connections. Attach the wires to your outlet or switch and then push the wires back into the box. Screw the device into the box and install the cover plate. Turn the power back on and test your work. That was easy! We hope that you found our pigtail wiring DIY guide useful.

If you're hesitant about doing any electrical work yourself we know, live wires can be frightening feel free to contact Any Hour Services today to set up an appointment to have our professional Utah electricians come to your home.

Our licensed electricians can help Utah homeowners with any size electrical project, from a simple electrical pigtail to complete home rewiring. We know you have lots of choices as far as electricians. We want to help and hope you will give us an opportunity to prove the things listed above are not just a list on a website but the way we strive to do business. If you still have questions or would like to schedule an electrical repair service, give us a call and let us know how we can help.

I am very happy with the service. We arrive with a fully stocked truck, ready to complete the work while at your home. Submit your question and we will email you a response as quickly as possible. These questions and answers may be added to our website to serve the community as best as we can.

Thank you for your question! Send My Coupon. Electrical Pigtails troubleshooting and repairs. What is an electrical pigtail?

Cut Power First and foremost, cut the power - safety first! Disconnect from Device Once you've confirmed the wires are dead, disconnect them from the device and separate your wires by color. Prepare Wires When you have your wires grouped by color, it's time to prepare them for the pigtail. Twist Wires Together Place your extra neutral wire next to the neutral wires inside the box and use your pliers to twist the wires together. Finish Up Go ahead and strip the end of your new pigtail wires to make fresh connections.

Still need Help? Easy Online Booking Answer a few questions, select your appointment date, and we'll dispatch our expert technicians. All Coupons. All Coupons Sign up for early access to monthly promotions! Up-Front Pricing We'll give you a price before we begin any work. Trustworthy Techs Drug-tested and background-checked technicians. At Your Service We arrive with a fully stocked truck, ready to complete the work while at your home. Real People Speak to a real person on the phone, 24hrs a day, six days a week!

Tali was very good and professional. He was on time. He got me out of bed because I almost forgot about my tune up. Highly recommend! They were extremely helpful! We didn't have heat but they set us up with really nice space heaters until they could come install the heater for us. Will and Matt took careful time installing everything and making sure we understood how to care for it and the proper way to use it. Awesome service and helped us first time home buyers to understand everything.

Thank you so much! They came in a timely manner. They were thorough in their inspection and repair of our furnace. I appreciated their friendly and upfront conversation and willingness to do what we wanted done. Very happy with their service. My experience with Any Hour Services was fantastic.

Notify me about replies to my post Post Reply. RBM Contact options for registered users. Not knowing the wiring scheme in your outlet box, he may just be advising you of the safest way to wire it. In some cases there are two circuits brought into a junction box , sharing a neutral, for several runs of outlets, lights or whatever.

When you have this situation, you cannot have the neutral conductors dependent upon a device, which is to say, they must be pigtailed. When you pigtail outlets, if one outlet fails, the others aren't affected. Show Quoted Text. Reply to RBM. Reply to zxcvbob. Toller Contact options for registered users. Reply to Toller. It is a code thing, an NEC code thing. On multiwire branch circuit, Edison circuit Neutrals cannot be dependent upon a device Show Quoted Text. It's not for that reason.

IF, you have an Edison circuit, which is one where two hot legs of different potential, share a neutral, and you loose the continuity of the neutral, you get a volt circuit between the two hot legs. Even momentarily this can cause havoc Show Quoted Text. Reply to gfretwell.