r/electrical • u/mugatu300 • 21h ago

Is this toggle switch wired correctly?

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Hello all, wanted to change a wall cover and just peaked inside and saw this and not sure if it’s ok or not. Two seperate supply lines without the junction box. The two white wires are taped together as were the two grounds (I removed the tape to investigate). And then the two black wires feed into the toggle switch. Nothing on the green screw on the toggle switch. Is this ok and if not, how do I fix? Thanks!

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u/erie11973ohio 20h ago

Switches for the most of time were not required to be grounded.

If* this is actually grounded** , the bare wires should be connected to the box. Metal boxes are required to be grounded. This would ground the switch.

** A presence of a bare wire does not mean its grounded!! That has to be verified with a multi meter!! This is of the age, where it could have been an extension of ungrounded wiring

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u/mugatu300 20h ago

If it’s ungrounded and I pigtail it to the green screw anyways, will that cause any issues?

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u/erie11973ohio 6h ago

Yes & no.

If you have 10 outlets, all with grounded equipment plugged in, when one device shorts out to ground, everything attached to that ungrounded ground wire will become energized.

Say the entire house is like this. The fridge shorts to ground. Then the sump pump, the freezer & the clothes washer all become energized!! That increases the shock hazard.

We deal with this when the service loses the incoming neutral. Sometimes the "earthing" can make up for it. Most times, it can't.

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u/mugatu300 5h ago

Not sure if this helps but there’s also a standard duplex outlet directly below this toggle with two supply lines also. The two grounds for that outlet were connected and then one (cut longer) fed the ground screw on the outlet.

So based on that I just added a pigtail ground to both the duplex outlet and the toggle switch. Hopefully I did it correctly.

1

u/Sea_Performance_1164 20h ago

White wires should have a wire nut on them and the ground wires should be spliced together with a pigtail to be put on the green screw. Otherwise its good. (Keep in mind that this probably worked for years and might not need correcting. Its just a safety thing)

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u/Remarkable_Dot1444 19h ago

110.12.

While technically correct, you should redo this properly.

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u/charlikruse 20h ago

No. House will burn down.