Basic Electrical, Replacing an Outlet

There are several reasons that you might need to replace an electrical outlet. You may have just painted a room and need to coordinate the color of your outlets and switches to match, or maybe your upgrading from old worn out ones, whatever the reason, here is how you can do it yourself.

The first thing that you want to do is make sure that you have cut off the power to the outlet before you begin. Electricity has no sympathy for an honest mistake, so be sure the power is off on the circuit that your working on. It’s easy to do, just use a circuit tester like the one in the picture, or plug a lamp into the outlet and turn it on. Then go to your breaker box and locate the right switch for the outlet circuit and turn it off. Be aware that not all circuit breakers are marked correctly, if at all in some homes, that’s were the circuit tester or lamp comes in. After you’ve turned off the circuit, check to see if the tester or lamp is off, if so your ready to continue, if not, try a different circuit until you get it turned off. Never attempt to change an outlet or switch with the power on.

You only need 2 tools to install a new outlet, a pair of wire strippers and a screwdriver like I have pictured here. I like a multi-screwdriver with reversible tips. That way I have the right screwdriver for nearly any screw. The wire strippers I have pictured allow you to trim back wire insulation if you need to, and have a nice plier type tip to assist you in bending the wire if needed as well.

Start by removing the center screw in the cover plate and removing the plate. It might be stuck to the wall from old paint, just pry it loose and it’ll come right off. There are 2 screws that hold the outlet to the wall box, one at the top and one at the bottom, just crew these out to allow you to pull the outlet out of the wall box. Now you can see the wiring. Some older homes only have two wires, a black one (hot wire) and a white one (the neutral). In a newer home you should have a bare ground wire to.

Remove the wires form the old outlet by loosening the screws that secure them to the outlet. When wiring up the new outlet be sure to put the black wire on the gold colored screw and the white wire on the silver screw. These screws are also marked on the back of the outlet so you can’t get them mixed up. This ensures that the polarity is correct for the outlet. The bare wire goes on the green screw (ground). When making these connections, you want to make a hook with the end of the wire (like in the picture) to go around the screw, then tighten the screw. Make sure that all wires are connected correctly and all screws are tight, even the screws that don’t have wires on them should be run all the way in.

Push the outlet back into the wall box and secure with the top and bottom mounting screws and install your new cover plate.

It’s a good ideal at this point to have a circuit tester, so when you turn the power on you can check to see if the connections are correct. The tester has a legend on it so that you can easily see if your outlet has the right polarity and ground. It’s a good idea to to check all outlets in your home, this can indicate a potential problem with your wiring if your outlets don’t test good.

And that’s all there is to it. Remember to be safe when dealing with electricity, and have fun with your home improvement projects.