Which receptacle is the best?

yan54188

I'll replace all the receptacles. But the question is, which brand is better?

Lowes has this onsale:
Aspire™ 15-Amp Receptacle for only $2.85
but the similar part Aspire™ 15-Amp Receptacle GFCI costs $13.61.
what gives?

Any suggestions on the brand??

Thanks in advance!

J187

GFCI is a ground fault circuit interupter, designed to protect people from being electrocuted and is used commonly in bathrooms and kitchen areas. There are certain NEC codes surrounding the use of these receptacles. Please don't take this the wrong way, but if you are going to replace the receptacles in your home, read up on it first. There are a lot of variables with electricity and it's a dangerous thing to experiment with for you, your family and your house. IF you are not familiar with electricity, get yourself a book. One that I just recently bought for a friend is the Black and decker, complete guide to home wiring. It is an outstanding book with lots of pictures. I'm only assuming that you are not too familiar w/ electricity because you seem surprised at the price of GFCIs and possibly that you didn't understand what they were. As far as brand of receptacle goes. I'd say that the standard ones they sell at lowes will work fine, they are a pretty simple and standard item. However, there are many options like GFCI, heavy duty, white, ivory, etc etc. Which is why you wan't to have a basic understanding of home wiring first. You will also encounter different wiring schemes as you explore your receptacles. YOu will find that different rooms might have similar receptacles wired very differently depending on the situation they are in like: Middle of circuit, end of circuit, controlled by a switch, split circuit (meaning top plug is on a different circuit than bottom plug) etc etc. Good luck and keep the Qs coming.

yan54188

Thanks a bunch, J!!

Yeap, I'm a newbie on home improvement. After reading a wiring book from Lowes, I've already found that the electritian did a very poor job in our house . For instance, he connect the garadge door opener to the outlet in the bathroom upstairs.

Again, thanks for sharing your experience!

J187

Yeah, I'm finding some electrical no-nos in my new house as well. Chief among them? The wall sconce in my bathroom was live when I did my walkthrough. Yup, the whole damn thing - LIVE.

Anyway, keep at the reading. You'll find that the stuff makes more and more sense as you go. The truly most important things to remember are this

1. ALWAYS test the actual wires you are working with to see if they are live. Even if you are fairly certain that you've turned off the circuit.
2. Never assume anything is ok to do, if you don't know for sure, check codes. there are regulations for everything right down to how far apart you staple wire to studs, etc, etc, etc.
3. Never cut corners and always make sure you double check everything.
4. Research each project. Know what you are doing before hand.

Good luck.

Oh, just out of curiousity, what made you decide to change all of the receptacles?

Speedy Petey

See reply in other thread.

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troubleseeker

you're comparing apples to oranges here. The less expensive one is a regular receptacle, while the other is a GFCI receptacle.

I'm not familiar with that brand, but I like to stick with the better known like Leviton, Lutron, etc; also available at the big boxes. More important than brand is to spend a little more and get a quality device, not the "el cheapo" contracter grade.

Speedy Petey

Again, see reply in other thread.

__________________
Sometimes I feel like if I answer any more questions it is like someone trying to climb over a fence to jump off a bridge and me giving them a boost.