GFCI wiring procedure

It sounds like you have a ready-made built-in fault. Why would you not want to resolve it properly?

Just don't hook anything up to the load wires.

Chris

There is no reason why it shouldn't work. Units with smart lock won't reset unless you've turned the power back on.

The smartlock, unlike other GFCIs, will not send power to the "line" side if it is installed backwards. This is to specifically prevent what you want to do. Are you absolutely sure that is not what you are doing?

If you are pigtailing it, the GFCI would have no way to affect the pigtailed circuit since they don't go through the device. So what ever your problem is, it does not involve the GFCI.

Whoever installed that GFCI clearly does not understand how they work, and, equally clearly, did not read the directions.

There certainly is -- follow the directions that came with your new GFCI. I *promise* they do *not* tell you to wire it the way you're trying to.

IMHO:

1. Only qualifed electricians should work with electricity.

1. Follow the manufactures directions.

2. Verifty you have the pigtailed leads hooked up to the proper terminals. If you are only looking to protect this receptacle, then the terminals should be "Line".

1. Ensure you wired correctly. "hot" to brass/gold screw, and "neutral" to silver screw. Equipment "Grounding" wire to green screw.

2. Make sure the wire connections are tight. I.E. check under wire nuts, wires secure in terminals, etc.

hth,

tom @

The only thing I can think of is that you may have somehow misidentified the load and line terminals on that GFCI and are feeding the power into the load terminals instead of the line terminals.

As others have already said, if PROPERLY wired as you intended, the GFCI won't give a rat's ass about what else may be connected to its line side.

Jeff

You shouldn't need to pigtail the GFCI. All of the new ones I have seen have 2 wire holes per termination so you can connect the in and out to one terminal. As the other posters have said, ber sure you have ot polarized right (white and black) and you are connected to the line side.

Why wouldn't it work with pigtails? The GFCI comes off the pigtail, and the downstream outlets come off the pigtail. Everything is in order.

The only way to wire it so it does what he wants is to take the downstream outlets off the line side, if there are enough backstab connections to do that. but then it is exactly the same as pigtails.

Hire a professional electrician. You are not qualified to do this repair and if you do, your home will burn to the ground and kill everyone in your home. Shut off all power in your home immediately and call an electrician. This is not a joke. Run to your breaker panel IMMEDIATELY and disconnect the main breaker NOW. As soon as you do, call the Fire Department and tell them there is a fire inside this outlet box (because there is).

Department of Electrical Safety

No, it's not in order. Read what he wrote again: "the line and load wires are spliced together." Wrong, wrong, wrong. Either his description is wrong, or the wiring is wrong -- but something is definitely very wrong.

That shouldn't happen if you connect it properly. Connect everything to the LINE terminals on the GFCI and nothing to the LOAD terminals.

There's something ambiguous here. Does "the line and load wires are spliced together." refer to the wires coming from the LINE and LOAD terminals of the GFCI (wrong) or does it refer to the wires coming into and out of the box?

When I see "pigtailed" in reference to GFCI wiring, I already know it's wired wrong.

I made the assumption that the black line wire was pigtailed to a black going to the GFCI and a black wire going to the downstream outlets. Same for the white wires. I don't see another interpretation that would have let the old GFCI work.

Phooey. There's no ambiguity about it. In plain English, "A and B are spliced together" means they are spliced to _each_other_.

That may, or may not, be what the OP _intended_ to write, but it certainly is what he _did_ write.

Guess again. Pigtailed is exactly how you *should* wire it, if you intend for the GFCI to *not* protect any downstream outlets. We can debate all day long whether such an intention is wise, prudent, reasonable, etc. but it unquestionably is not "wrong".

One would _hope_ that's the case... but that's clearly *not* what the OP wrote.

Neither do I -- but I also don't see any indication anywhere that it _did_ work. My guess is that it doesn't, and that's why he's replacing it -- because he doesn't know it's wired wrong, and thinks it's defective.

Most new GFCIs have dual terminations on each screw so you gan effectively "pigtail" the connection in the device. The exception is if this is on the load side of a multiwire circuit where the code says you must not use the device to complete the neutral circuit.