ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Ground pin up / down - anyone else noticed this

Many of the Fridges, that I have seen, mine included, the cord goes up from the outlet. Which would be fine for the A/C unit above the receptacle, but when the outlet is 54" up the wall the cord loops up then down again to the bottom of the fridge. I personally dont like the way it looks, so I flipped the receptacle behind my fridge, ground up.

I wish there was something in NEC that required that the cord be taken into consideration.

Our old office was wired by a "ground up" guy who had a 'my way or the highway' attitude.
Every single one of our desktop copiers had a wire taped to the wall because it had an angled plug on the cord. Once the cord went up about 2 feet, it turned back down to get to the copier. This was a case where it really stressed the receptacle (and looked like garbage) because of the ground pin orientation.

BTW, all of the quads in my shop have 1 duplex with the ground up and the other with the ground down. I've done basement quads the same way to account for the washer and dryer plugs.

Here's the only logic that I have ever noticed with regard to this subject. It seems that clothes washers always have a 90 degree (flat) plug, yet gas dryers always have a 180 degree (straight) plug. This permits both appliances to share the same duplex receptacle.

I haven't seen a gas dryer in nearly 30 years in these parts, in fact this "knowledge" comes from watching home improvement shows that showcase California, Chicago, New York or New Jersey homes. Electrical people keep an eye out for those things, you know.

Most clothes dryers here are electric, so I can't say that my observations on this topic are completely accurate.

The British Post Office followed the same use of slate in telephone wiring. It's "grey" for the recently adopted new phase color in IEE/power wiring though.

The ground up/down debate is simply a non-issue here. Since our 13A plugs were designed as right-angle devices with earth pin at the top and cord exiting downward right from the outset, ground up is the only normal orientation (it was the same with the older style outlets that these replaced).

One thing I have noticed though: Some of the imported "wall warts" have the label upside down when plugged into a standard ground-up British outlet.

Both my gas dryer and my washing machine have straight plugs.

My observation has been that many of the homes in Northern VA built in the early to mid 80s are all electric. I suspect this was due to concerns about the price of natural gas at the time.

My house, built in Manassas, VA in 1995, has a gas dryer but there is a receptacle for an electric dryer.

When I lived and worked there I never knew it was different from anywhere else. Then someone from Wisconsin asked me about it, and I didn't know what to tell them. Then I moved to PA and here they are all vertical. I told people that they were horizontal in Chicago and the first thing they asked was "How do they nail the plastic boxes on the studs sidways?" haha--plastic boxes, yeah right! No MC boxes either!

My personal preference has always been ground-down, for anthropomorphic reasons. A NEMA 5-15R looks like a face. It just looks like it "wants" to be ground-down!

I have seen a few fridges, and once owned one, with a ground-up cord. So I installed that receptacle ground-up. I flipped it when I bought a new fridge.

Electric ranges/dryers nearly always have ground-up cords, so I always install NEMA 14 receptacles ground-up, to avoid stressing the connection.

Article 551 illustrates receptacle configurations for RV parks, and shows all of them ground-up. However, I don't see a requirement for such an installation. This is the closest the NEC gets to taking a side on the issue.

." haha--plastic boxes, yeah right! No MC boxes either ! "

yeah,it was pretty much the response I had when I actually saw Romex and those goofy in the box clamps the first time......