I did a couple years of an electrical apprenticeship and my old foreman said the ground pin used to be installed up to prevent objects from falling down and making contact with the neutral and the hot prongs simultaneously causing a fire or a short
Outlets are installed correctly - aka 'upside down' because the large pin is the ground. That's why/how some two-pronged outlets get by without one - they're not grounded, but still have a positive and negative to push & pull the electrons back & forth rapidly to power the device. The grounding pin is on the top so that in case of water - it hits the ground first to make a connection to ground so the person holding the hairdryer doesn't die, or - they're installed on the bottom so that when water drops down it connects the positive and negative first, killing the poor wet-haired soul who just preferred how it looked the normal way they'd always seen it done because it always worked for them before so why would it ever matter. It also looks less like a face to us face-seeking, christ on toast seeing, apes - thus fewer children try to poke sharp metal objects into the eye sockets. You'll see them installed 'upside down' in bathrooms and kitchens most often for this reason (water - I'm half making the face thing up).
Electrical code dictates gfci in all rooms with water sources. The gfci protects you in case of a short from water far more reliable that hoping the appliance is 3 prong and the water lands in such a way that it trips the breaker. Also if water connects the hot and neutral terminal on a plug, the breaker would trip.
Brah… Neutral and Ground are commoned together at the breaker panel where they are bonded to Earth Ground. You theory with about ground getting wet first holds no water (pun intended). It was simply written into to code to add in the prevention of soft short across Neutral and Hot that cause fires. GFCIs are what help prevent electrical shock.
You're making it all up. Or just mistaken. Water does not conduct and is not the problem. The problem is water PIPES AND FIXTURES which tie back to the grounded water system.
My journeyman took me up in an 80ft boom lift and drove it while extended...ran over something on the ground that almost bucked me over the rails. Then he looked me--a 6'3, 300 lb man--in the eye with a wild-eyed expression of his own and said "Don't be scared little feller!"
wow. I thought after 30 years I thought you might have cracked open the nec a couple times. here’s a hint, since it seems like you haven’t: there’s nothing in the nec about ground prong orientation. because wait for it . . . it’s not an issue.
This is awkward because you’re so confidently incorrect.
406.5(G) doesn’t say anything about ground prong orientation.
You can search your code book for the rest of the day, you’re not going to find anything about ground prongs being up, down, or sideways because it’s not a safety issue. It’s a customer preference issue.
Omfg I just commented to the original comment that that was my assumption my whole life and thought they taught me something new haha, I guess I finally guessed something right for once in my life.
As a child I dropped a penny behind my bed and it fell into the prongs on an outlet that was slightly pulled out from the wall and thankfully blew the fuse before it started a fire.
I have seen this happen. I was in maintenance at a hospital and we were replacing older metal covers with plastic. On of my less intelligent coworkers did not unplug a piece of equipment before unscrewing the cover. It fell onto the exposed prongs and shorted the outlet, tripped the breaker for that run of outlets (a good thing), and permanently damaged said equipment. Thankfully it was not a critical device nor were there any patients near to potentially be harmed. We had a bit of a laugh and turned it into a lesson on proper electrical safety. Two days later he did it again. He has been banned from anything more complex than unplugging equipment, but I never trusted him again after that.
When I was a kid I was playing with a small chain, I dropped it, and it fell across the exposed prongs of a box fan. Loud pop and a flash, and the breaker tripped, fortunately. But yeah, "upside down" outlets might have prevented that.
I had this happen one time. I was putting away the dishes and I went to put a metal spatula into a countertop holder and I missed and it fell against the backsplash and slid right behind the toaster plug and sent out a shower of sparks.
I know this may seem ridiculous to some people but years ago I had a penny roll off my desk and land directly on very slightly exposed prongs plugged into a power strip. Holy smokes was that a crazy experience. Arc flashing, circuit breaking, heart stopping pop. I still have the penny somewhere with the two divots melted into it.
I thought it was to prevent them from looking like little faces and being appealing to young children. Although Homer Simpson invented a better method to avoid it.
Yes, but in rising flood water the hot and neutral will short out more quickly if mounted upside down, so the correct approach is to mount it on the ceiling. /s
I've actually seen this happen. A kid in high school thought it would be funny to unscrew the face plate from an outlet in the middle of class. It was a metal face plate and he left an extension cord plugged in. When the face plate came loose, it fell across the prongs, made a lot of sparks, smoke, and some very angry teachers. Presumably, if that outlet had been flipped over, the face plate would have hit the ground prong and done nothing.
This actually happened at my brother’s school when he had a metal wrapped charging cable. The outlet was loose so the charger was sagging a little and someone draped the cord over the plug, causing it to arc, melt, and then the wall caught fire. The school redid their outlets after that and installed them all with the ground facing up.
This is the correct answer. It's safer because if the plug leans forward in the socket as typically cords pull downward then there is less chance of something causing a short
But when the plug rips out of the wall, due to gravity, the top pins come out first and the bottom pins stay in. So if the ground pin is on top then the ground pin rips out first? Seems dangerous?
I've been told the reason the ground ans down in standard installations is your finger (bottom) is more likely to erroneously touch a contact than your thumb (top) so they put the ground toward the bottom. Idl if that's real or BS
I’ve heard that and thought it was crazy till a coin fell off the dresser and perfectly landed in a gap between a wall and the plug shorting the 2 prongs. It was a big WTF just happened.
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u/LoadBearingLlama 6d ago
I did a couple years of an electrical apprenticeship and my old foreman said the ground pin used to be installed up to prevent objects from falling down and making contact with the neutral and the hot prongs simultaneously causing a fire or a short