Electrical outlets - which way up?

When mounting an 120v A/C outlet in a box, which way do you prefer the ground leg to go?

  • On bottom, below hot & neutral, so it makes a face

  • On top, above hot & neutral, so it makes a house

  • Only pansies use grounded A/C outlets.

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RatLabGuy

RatLabGuy

You look like a monkey and smell like one too
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Churchville, MD
OK to stop congesting Snappy's thread.

A/C outlets, which way do you prefer them to point? I've found overt he years some people are very particular about this.

Does the ground leg (center, long pin) go above, or below, the hot and neutral?
 
Personally, I'm converting our whole house to NEMA L5 receptacles. It's time-consuming, but the peace of mind will be worth it when we're through.
 
IMO the ground holds better when it's an "upside down" smiley face, but aesthetically I always install the ground on the bottom for customers.
 
I stand by my statement... The wife is right....even if she is wrong.
 
I was told that the ground goes on top so that if something were to fall and hit the cord, and it came out, it would only contact the ground plug, and couldn't somehow short the hot and neutral together.

I don't care, but when they are 'upside down' some of the low clearance plugs are useless.
 
Chris_M said:
I was told that the ground goes on top so that if something were to fall and hit the cord, and it came out, it would only contact the ground plug, and couldn't somehow short the hot and neutral together.
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Yes.... we should all worry about the correct orientation of the outlet and force electricians to come up with a unified standard because the potential of the perfect storm of a metal object falling at such a perfect angle with such trajectory to only partially dislodge the cord, but allow the metal to complete the circuit and starting a fire is so much greater than the odds of a douchbag doing this:


awww.cpsenergy.com_images_outlet_overloaded.jpg
 
code doesnt specify. installer preference.

Im converting my house to wireless outlets anyway.

awww.thinkgeek.com_images_products_zoom_wec.jpg
 
Reid said:
code doesnt specify. installer preference.

Im converting my house to wireless outlets anyway.

View attachment 180441
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Has the state of Kalifornia determined if those cause cancer yet? If not, I can save them a couple million bucks...
 
Chris_M said:
I was told that the ground goes on top so that if something were to fall and hit the cord, and it came out, it would only contact the ground plug, and couldn't somehow short the hot and neutral together.

I don't care, but when they are 'upside down' some of the low clearance plugs are useless.
Click to expand...
Isn't that what a breaker box is for?
 
I take it you've never seen a breaker weld itself in the shut position? I do ground up. It doesn't look right, but working in factories and on a lot of electro-mechanical equipment I've seen breakers fail in some pretty stellar ways (weld themselves shut, fireball in the panel causing other breakers to fail, etc)
 
I'm a ground on bottom for it holds much better in my house. Elsewhere I put them on top. But commercial code makes total sense and wondered why I always see them that way.
 
JonKarl said:
I take it you've never seen a breaker weld itself in the shut position? I do ground up. It doesn't look right, but working in factories and on a lot of electro-mechanical equipment I've seen breakers fail in some pretty stellar ways (weld themselves shut, fireball in the panel causing other breakers to fail, etc)
Click to expand...
Nope, point taken
 
Nah if the breaker is "welded shut" and you introduce a short its still as short. Really in that rarest of circumstances neither is safe in the infmous butter knife falling on the prongs scenario.

Whether its hot to ground or hot to neutral you are escalating current quickly and you are tripping a breaker SOMEWHERE even if the lowest downstream is "welded shut"...you are just about to learn how good the coordination study was.

BTW welded shut breakers are just about impossible with modern thermal mag breakers.
 
I stand by my theory that from the real-world standpoint of plugs getting pulled on, ground-down is safer.
 
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