Outlet Tester Light Meanings - Examining All Combinations

[@HouseOfHacks]

How to use an outlet tester: kzbin.info/www/bejne/o5vReJ6brZmXrrM Get an outlet tester of your own: amzn.to/2V0EX3J (Affiliate link)

[@petejones4093]

This is actually a pretty awesome video, great informational, thank you sir.

[@HouseOfHacks]

You're welcome! Glad you liked it!

[@chuyrodriguez8470]

Hey Harley very informative you make sense to me thanks

[@hogie1685]

THIS IS EXACTLY THE VIDEO I WAS LOOKING FOR. FOUND IT FIRST SHOT!!!!! Perfect man. Thanks a lot.

[@litotorres3670]

This is a very informative video.. thank you so much

[@heathconnett6387]

Thank you! This helped me realize I didn’t know how to read my Ames tester’s legend. I was thinking white legend meant on when it’s the darker yellow legend paint that means on.

[@311DaveR]

Great test - great video! Really well done. Thanks

[@HouseOfHacks]

Thank you!

[@podzhopnik]

hi, i have an outlet that has no power and tester show 'correct' readout, BUT center light is faint and right light is bright. have you ever seen such display? thanks

[@Sparky-ww5re]

Likely a poor neutral connection that allows enough current to light up the middle light, but fails when a real load is connected.

[@jsubs]

Hey Harley, found number 13. I have all 3 lights on my tester. Any ideas?

[@soundshaper]

What does it mean if you have an outlet circuit connected to a 15 amp breaker that trips after a few minutes on with no load and when you use the tester, both yellow lights are on but are flickering?

[@michaelmann-worley275]

Hey @houseofhacks theres another configuration that has all lights lit up. What does that mean

[@Sparky-ww5re]

All three lights lit means the outlet has 240 volts, or somewhere close to it. Either because of a floating neutral on a multiwire branch circuit eg. a 12/3 romex in your kitchen supplying the two circuits for the countertop outlets with the black and red sharing a common neutral, or someone installed a standard 120 volt 15 or 20A outlet on a dedicated circuit when they really needed a single outlet 240V 15/20A, such as you might find in your living room or garage for something like a larger air conditioner or electric heater exceeding 1500 watts (the electrical Code and UL standards limit the plug-in space heaters to 1500 watts when a 120V 15A two or three pronged plug is factory installed)

[@HoracioCamachoNJ]

I have the same and red and yellow lights are on. Tested voltage with multimeter and it's 120v. I wonder what's going on? You didn't talk about that option above!

[@SuzyTopAgent]

This was a Fantastic video Harley 👍 Definitely learned a lot ( & took lots of shots at the end 😂🥃)

[@HouseOfHacks]

Thanks Suzy! Just no driving at the end. :-D

[@joegaudet7289]

Great video - thank you

[@Francois_Dupont]

2:29 old houses around here (Qc, canada) have the ground and neutral on the same bus bar in the electrical panel. to the house are just the two phase (120AC) coming in, the ground/neutral come tru the earth(soil outside). it is why it is important to have a good grounding(soil) for the house. also you can see every other telephone pole has a grounding spike. sometimes they corrode and it can cause problems. i have heard stories of homeowner removing their grounding rod to do some renovation and they got electrocuted to death. i have discovered this while seeing that only two wires came to my house from above, and that the metal cable intertwined between them was not connected to anything and was just a support for the other two. i saw inside my panel all the ground and neutral connected together so i then understood.

[@HouseOfHacks]

Hi Francois! Yeah, old wiring can be dodgy sometimes. A work buddy of mine had a house built in the 1840s. When he moved in, different parts of the house were wired to different standards, including some that was bare wire running through the attic with knob and tube insulators. (It had started with fabric insulation but that had decayed over the years. He found it lying under the wire.) When he was done with it, it was all up to modern code. My understanding, is the neutral wire here in the US goes to ground at the electrical substation, so the only real difference between ground and neutral is where the ground is located.

[@Francois_Dupont]

@@HouseOfHacks i found some of those ceramic insulators before. very strange to know they even considered using something like this in the past. my current house has tar and paper wiring with some new add-on with the modern PVC cabling. i wish you great health and success in anything you do!

[@HouseOfHacks]

@@Francois_Dupont Yeah, some of the things that used to be done would never happen today due to the cost. We just had some relatively expensive houses build next to us over the past 2 years and I was surprised how cheap some of the materials were. Peace!

[@okaro6595]

I truly doubt that there is no neural coming in. That would limit the power and put a deadly voltage gradient on the ground. The neutral may be on the sheath of the cable. No circuit breaker will trip in case of fault if there is no neutral.

[@Francois_Dupont]

@@okaro6595 no actually, since both phase are 180degrees from each other most of the power get cancelled inside the panel in the house. for example if you take 14amps from one phase and 12amps from the other there is only 2amps going thru the ground/neutral to the telephone pole. it is why all the circuits in the panels are always installed at interval. one is on one phase, and the next circuit is on the other phase. are you in Canada? if you want to know just go watch a couple of electricians video about this. i am sure they would explain it all in detail.

[@ronfoster6523]

1) all three lights on.2) center light flashes on and off at about 1 second intervals

[@scottreed2097]

I have a center light bright, right light dim until i push the test button, then it shows hot/neutral reverse. It is clearly wired correctly and reversing the hot/neutral wires didn't change it. Any tips?

[@Sparky-ww5re]

I've ran across this once in an older home built in the 50s with metal boxes and no ground in the wiring but the box was partially grounded on a basement wall. What you have is an open or very poor ground. The test button on your plug tester is used to trip a GFCI and does that through a resistor connected across the hot and ground to simulate a 30mA ground fault and verify that a GFCI receptacle or breaker is functioning properly. Because there is no ground on your receptacle pushing the test button on the tester applied voltage on the ground, and the red light lights where there is voltage between neutral and ground. The middle light indicates voltage between hot and neutral. The righthand orange light indicates voltage between hot and ground. You can use a multimeter to check the voltages on a properly wired, a hot/neutral reverse, and other miswired configuration outlet from hot-neutral, hot-ground and neutral-ground to get an idea of how a three light tester works if you're really curious.

[@daddydawg1902]

Beautiful! I have the 'Open Ground..single middle light on my Ames GFCI tester and that code is NOT shown! I have the SAME at the GFCI at the beginning of the Run next to the Breaker Box. THIS Seems to be the Place to start! Got to watch some GFCI Wiring vids again next! ! Thanks!

[@HouseOfHacks]

You're welcome! Happy to help!

[@johnt7776]

This is awesome thank you

[@ToddAutry]

Great presentation!!!

[@HouseOfHacks]

Thanks Todd!

[@skeetermcswagger0U812]

There's one more undocumented configuration of the lights. It's 1 that all 3 lights are lit because there is AGFI circuit with no ground except 1 and appliances plugged in they will a luminate all 3 lights at once.

[@ericbigras3117]

Just tested on of my gfi outlets and it lit up just like that. I don’t use the outlet, should I be concerned?

[@jojopuerto]

What happens when You have one solid yellow and one lighter lit middle yellow light? Its like almost "correct" but nothing is working.

[@Sparky-ww5re]

Poor neutral connection. The middle light is connected across hot to neutral. Allows enough current to light up the middle light but fails under load when a real appliance is connected.

[@user-em6ie2be7x]

My tester has a button on the top, what does it do? Thanks for the response.

[@howardkass5912]

What does it mean if all 3 lights come on? The center light is strong and both outside lights flicker.

[@charlesn.salgado-gouker118]

Thank you!

[@robertlee4172]

2:29...my 15 amp gfci outlet shows two amber lights. Any appliance plugged in won't run. But the Sperry circuit tester shows it's a hot outlet. The outlet was installed 31 years ago, so I suspect just a replacement gfci outlet at 15 amps. Is this my first course to repair the defective electrical outlet or are there others to consider first?

[@jpatel4006]

Hello, I am using Sperry Outlet tester and I get all THREE lights on an outlet. Replaced outlet but still no luck. I tested with multimeter and only getting 6-7 volts. Anything else I can try? Thanks so much.

[@okaro6595]

Better to call an electrician. Problem solving is not for laymen.

[@adolfoperez8228]

If my outlet is showing open neutral, more thank likely the outlet is bad??

[@Boon-ie1rq]

What does it mean when all 3 lights are on? Does it mean it's all crossed up on the circuit?

[@Sparky-ww5re]

All three lights lit means the outlet has 240 volts, or somewhere close to it. Either because of a floating neutral on a multiwire branch circuit eg. a 12/3 romex in your kitchen supplying the two circuits for the countertop outlets with the black and red sharing a common neutral, or someone installed a standard 120 volt 15 or 20A outlet on a dedicated circuit when they really needed a single outlet 240V 15/20A, such as you might find in your living room or garage for something like a larger air conditioner or electric heater exceeding 1500 watts (the electrical Code and UL standards limit the plug-in space heaters to 1500 watts when a 120V 15A two or three pronged plug is factory installed)

[@billdimasi3675]

Good video. Thanks. I was checking an outlet with a Sperry outlet tester and all three lights came on. I re-tested several times and kept getting the same result. I even had a friend verify what I was seeing. Thinking the tester might be defective I tested several other outlets and all seemed fine. Have you ever seen this before, and if you have, what does it mean? Thanks again.

[@HouseOfHacks]

Hmm, I don't think I've seen that one, not sure what it means.

[@MarcoPerez-ck6rh]

I have that too

[@Sparky-ww5re]

Hmm, you might want to check the voltage with a multimeter. Since each bulb on a three light tester will only light up when there is a voltage difference between that particular bulb, the only likely way all three lights can come on would be that somebody has wired the outlet for 240 volts instead of 120. You'd have in this case, 240 volts between the hot and neutral, 120 volts between hot and ground, and then 120 volts between neutral and ground. Likely because someone installed the wrong type of receptacle for a large window AC unit instead of a proper outlet for that volt and amp rating, but if that is the case it is supposed to be on a dedicated circuit. I say "supposed to" because I have personally worked in old houses and I have seen stuff i would rather forget about.

[@MrChuckmason]

What if all 3 lights are lit up?

[@Sparky-ww5re]

All three lights lit means the outlet has 240 volts, or somewhere close to it. Either because of a floating neutral on a multiwire branch circuit eg. a 12/3 romex in your kitchen supplying the two circuits for the countertop outlets with the black and red sharing a common neutral, or someone installed a standard 120 volt 15 or 20A outlet on a dedicated circuit when they really needed a single outlet 240V 15/20A, such as you might find in your living room or garage for something like a larger air conditioner or electric heater exceeding 1500 watts (the electrical Code and UL standards limit the plug-in space heaters to 1500 watts when a 120V 15A two or three pronged plug is factory installed)

[@mts7274]

What if middle light is on, but the right side light is dim?

[@Sparky-ww5re]

Poor ground. Might happen in an old house with metal boxes and no ground wires. If you were to take a multimeter and test across hot-neutral, hot-ground and them neutral-ground you'd probably see 120V hot to neutral, a few volts hot to ground and 0 volts neutral to ground. A few volts is all that is needed for a neon indicator on a tester to glow dim.

[@TheChubbiesrCupcake]

Really informative video! Also, if anyone has misophonia, do yourself a favor and watch this muted with captions on.

[@mikeallumi6507]

I have a combination that you didn't mention, maybe because I have something different on my tester, I have the right light on, and the center light is flashing on one tester, and on my other circuit tester the right light is on, and the center light is dim. I am testing an outdoor plug that is in an outdoor protective box, and it has worked for a long time, but I am thinking the plug will need replacing because Christmas lights will not work on this receptacle, but Christmas light work in the house.

[@HouseOfHacks]

Don't know. The differences between the two testers is probably due to minor differences in their manufacturing. Possibly a partially bad connection that puts the tester in an indeterminate state. If it were me, I'd just replace the outlet.

[@mikeallumi6507]

@@HouseOfHacks I did attempt to replace the outlet, but had crazy problems. I had 110 volts at the wires going to the outlet in box, I used 2 different meters, to make sure it was not the first meter being a problem, and results were the same, but here is the good part- I connected a new GFCI and it would not power anything that I plugged into it. In fact it would not reset, and paperwork for the gfci said it needed to reset before it would work. So I said heck with that I will try a regular outlet, figuring I got it now, but that would not power anything I plugged into it. So I figured some Halloween goblins were hanging around an messing with me, and that is where this day ended.

[@HouseOfHacks]

Hmm, sounds like there may be a problem with the way the wires are connected at the other end before they get to this box. The fact that a GFCI wouldn't reset raises some red flags. I'd find the other outlets on this circuit and inspect them for problems. I know sometimes all the outdoor outlets for the house are on one circuit so it may be a problem with corrosion or other similar issue somewhere else. If it's to code, it should have a GFCI breaker somewhere on the circuit, so perhaps that's gone dodgy being exposed to the elements over the years.

[@ellemoon6182]

I have a question that is not covered...my test is showing on one outlet no red and two orange perfectly. In another room, it is the same, but the right orange light does not light up as bright on all outlets in the room. This light almost pulses, not on and off, but very slightly brighter to dimmer, though it does not go out. Why do they clearly light up in one room and the right orange light does light up, but not so much as the middle one?

[@HouseOfHacks]

I would first look to see what else is plugged into that circuit. I suspect there's either a high-current appliance that's putting an intermittent load on there that causes the light to flicker (such as a washing machine or microwave) or something on on that circuit has a problem that's causing the blinking. If it were me, I'd start unplugging things, one at a time. After each thing is removed, check the outlet tester and see if it's still blinking. If it's not, the last thing unplugged is the culprit. Note that circuits may span multiple rooms. There's not necessarily a one-circuit-to-one-room relationship.

[@ellemoon6182]

@@HouseOfHacks Thank you for your response. I live in an older, second floor, one bedroom apartment (built in 1973). So, who knows what's on the circuits. The breaker box is probably outside because it is not inside. :( The room in question is my bedroom, which I have only a laptop, an aroma diffuser and a lamp plugged in and suspect it's tied into the kitchen. I have noticed some irregularities throughout though. I have a GFCI in the kitchen that failed when I tried to test it. Had a heck of a time getting it back on. That can't be good. Have the same issues with bathroom GFCI but space is too tight to use the tester. My workstation is on the same circuit as my lil frig, (3.2 cu ft), when it kicks on one of three of my computer monitors goes black, but not off and then lights back up after a second. Plan to do some rearranging to eliminate that issue. I recently started earthing with mats. Thought I would try hooking one up in my bedroom last night and felt way to wired compared to using a foot mat and a desk mat at my work station. So, I decided that it was probably not a good idea to continue with the questionable bedroom outlets. However, would a grounded extension cord be acceptable to use with an outlet that tested correctly?

[@HouseOfHacks]

Ouch. In an older apartment, who knows how things are wired and where the circuits go. It's conceivable there are circuits that service multiple apartments, so isolating the issue may be a problem. On the workstation issue, an uninterruptible power supply might help with the monitor issue. As long as you don't have any high current devices, I'd expect the extension cord to work OK. Good luck!

[@ellemoon6182]

@@HouseOfHacks lol. I know. I knew they were older, but was shocked to find that old. Thank you for the recommendation for an uninterruptible power supply. Best wishes and thank you for the information you provide. :)

[@aspiealex9710]

Moved into a house where an outlet wasn't working, got an outlet tester and got a configuration that wasn't listed, it was the one at 3:07

[@oldplayground2965]

What happens if the wiring is correct. It’s showing it’s correct on the tester and you accidentally push the gfci test button and it shuts the lights off on the outlet strip?

[@HouseOfHacks]

Pushing the GFCI test button tripped either a GFCI switch or a breaker. You'll have to find where it's tripped and reset it.

[@ZinalaG59]

So basically if it’s on Correct wiring then everything is ok?

[@flyprincess69]

I have a 3 lights on?????😩

[@Sparky-ww5re]

All three lights lit means the outlet has 240 volts, or somewhere close to it. Either because of a floating neutral on a multiwire branch circuit eg. a 12/3 romex in your kitchen supplying the two circuits for the countertop outlets with the black and red sharing a common neutral, or someone installed a standard 120 volt 15 or 20A outlet on a dedicated circuit when they really needed a single outlet 240V 15/20A, such as you might find in your living room or garage for something like a larger air conditioner or electric heater exceeding 1500 watts (the electrical Code and UL standards limit the plug-in space heaters to 1500 watts when a 120V 15A two or three pronged plug is factory installed)

[@flyprincess69]

@@Sparky-ww5re Thanks for responding. Yes we figured this out and the worst it did blow the fuse in the brand new microwave. It’s an old house and we bought it in the middle of someone else’s remodel that walked away from it, so there were lots of puzzle pieces we had to sort out with the wiring. We believe it went to the laundry room. We’ve decommissioned the line and went natural gas to dryer and kitchen stove, to take the burden off the 100amp service panel. Thanks again!

[@NerdRN]

I have an outlet where all 3 lights are on??? Any ideas?? I pulled the outlet and the ground is grounded to a green screw on the case, and the neutral and hot are correct (Neutral is on the long T slot, its a 20 amp outlet, and hot is on the short...weird)

[@HouseOfHacks]

I'm not sure off the top of my head. With the green wire going to the box, I assume there's no ground wire in to coax? It's only two wires? I'd want to check that the box is actually grounded, although if it weren't, I'd expect it to read open ground. I suppose there might be some other issue somewhere in the circuit that's causing the problem, e.g if another outlet has something going to the box that it shouldn't that's feeding back into this one. Have you checked other outlets on the circuit? Are they correct? If so, it may be a problem with the outlet itself. I'm not sure what's weird about the neutral on the T slot for a 20 amp outlet; I think that's what it's supposed to be.

[@NerdRN]

@@HouseOfHacks no, sorry, the weird comment was for all 3 lights being on in general

[@HouseOfHacks]

Ah, right, that makes sense.

[@Sparky-ww5re]

I know i am three weeks late to reply, the only issue i can think of why you have all three lights on, would be that the outlet is wired for 240 volts instead of 120 volts like it should be. Since you mentioned it is a 20 amp outlet, a possibility would be someone previously had a large window air conditioner that runs on 240 volts but during a renovation no longer wanted the air conditioner and so removed the air conditioner outlet and replaced it with a standard 20 amp 120 volt outlet. If i were you i would take a multimeter and check the voltage.

[@NerdRN]

@@Sparky-ww5re Yep, you are correct! I posted this question on another video about this tester and he suggested the same thing as you, so I bought a multimeter, and you were both correct1 It is a 220v receptacle! THANK YOU so much for taking the time to reply! VERY much appreciated !

[@adriennaflores4148]

What if it starts blinking the lights

[@Sparky-ww5re]

Another thing these testers fail to detect is a bootleg ground, a very dangerous situation. Especially with a flipper house, before the early 1960s (1962 to be exact if i remember reading the NEC code book correctly) most homes were wired with fabric covered NM (aka romex) or armored cable (aka BX) that only included a hot and neutral..... no ground wire like is required today. In an attempt to fool inspectors and the average joe homeowner relying on these receptacle analyzers, what one of my fellow electrician calls "the 3 eyed liar" into think that the wiring has been probably updated and grounded to code. The renovators remove the two slot receptacles that originally came with the home, and replace them with the 3 slot receptacles. But because there is no ground in that box, to avoid failing an inspection because of open grounds, they would wire up outlet like usual, then take a short piece of wire and connect the neutral and ground together.

[@HouseOfHacks]

Interesting. My first house was built in 60 and didn't have grounded outlets. I'd not heard of the bootleg ground hack. I suppose it might be safer for a user though than an open ground, wouldn't it? If an appliance had an internal short that put hot to the case, at least it'd give the current a return path rather than through the user.

[@Sparky-ww5re]

@@HouseOfHacks in a way you are correct, in that the neutral and ground typically connect to the same bus bar in the panel. However, a neutral is a current carrying conductor, a ground wire normally does not, but will briefly to trip a breaker in case a hot wire grounded out to say, an electric drill with a metal casing while you are standing on a cement garage floor. Another very dangerous example would be the neutral wire opened somewhere upstream, or worse yet, hot and neutral reverse somewhere, such as might occur in a very old home that employs knob and tube wiring, where they might not even be color coded black and white like today, the ground and neutral might be hot and the hot would be neutral. Ironically, the 3 eyed liar will not detect this dangerous condition either

[@gabrielM1111]

In those homes The metel armor of cable and the boxes they connect to are the ground. Panel were grounded to rods or water pipe at the panel

[@okaro6595]

An important thing is that they cannot detect reverse bootleg ground with is absolutely deadly. If happens when you try to make a bootleg ground but for some reason the hot and neutral have been reversed and the white wire is hot. You can get what happens if you hook the ground to it.

[@Sparky-ww5re]

These outlet testers are great tools, no doubt, but can be an issue for the average joe that doesn't understand the many limitations that would require very specialized and expensive test equipment to diagnose such issues as bootleg grounds, high resistance connections, and voltage drop issues

[@HouseOfHacks]

Yep, they certainly don't test all the weird circuits might. It is a good sanity check for DIYs.

[@okaro6595]

These are for basic issue like lack of grounding, reverse polarity. These are not professional tools. It is much better to use these than to start poking with a multi-meter. I think lack of grounding is a real issue in old homes in the US as people just changed sockets without any consideration to safety. It is not so in the UK where all sockets have been grounded since the 30s or in Europe where there is no need to change sockets.

[@social3ngin33rin]

this is neat :)

[@HouseOfHacks]

Glad you liked it!

[@bababuilder]

when you put it hot in ground why your power supply didn't trip

[@kinsary]

My problem with the tester is that when I close the circuit I trip the breaker which means this tester wont even work and wont tell me what is wrong.

[@HouseOfHacks]

By "close the circuit" do you mean turn the circuit breaker on? If so, you have a short circuit somewhere that's not related directly to an outlet. This tester only works for checking the wiring of individual outlets, not an entire circuit.

[@kinsary]

@@HouseOfHacks thanks for the reply, i figured it out, process of elimination only told me that everything was fine, changed out the plug and all is well.

[@HouseOfHacks]

@@kinsary Awesome! Glad you got it figured out!

[@sambar1992]

Me trying my new tester😄 Me finding some issues😱

[@HouseOfHacks]

haha, yep. been there.

[@snowballisg]

i have a correct lighting but the left light is a bit dimmer than the other and no power what can this be every outlet in the room reads the same