Kitchen Split Circuit Receptacles Explained

hello again everybody I'm Teri Peterman the internet electrician and welcome again to one of my video shorts on current topics at electrical - online.com and of course right here on YouTube in today's video I'm going to talk to you about kitchen split receptacles that's where you have a top half and a bottom half on two separate circuits using a three wire cable and a double pole 15 amp breaker to feed it this was the way the code allowed you to wire kitchens prior to some changes that brought about the GFI being required pretty much all around the kitchen and only two required per 20 amp circuit the old code allowed you to have to split kitchen receptacles on one circuit one double pole 15 amp circuit I kind of liked that old system but with the advent of GFCI receptacles it made this wiring method kind of obsolete so it's an OK method as well 20 amp way better protection with the ground fault protection in there but the idea of the split receptacle is a good one so you're not allowed to use it at the kitchen anymore but in a shop or a garage it's a great way to have two separate outlets on two separate circuits using one cable let me explain that but first let's get started we're gonna open up this panel and explain how you would wire such a circuit so to understand how this circuit is wired we're gonna start right at the panel here's our 15 amp to pull breaker you see it's barred together so if one side trips it'll pull them both off to demonstrate that by just even pushing off one circuit you see how they'll both go off then you've got your two poles of that 15 amp to 40 volt circuit I've got red on the bottom black on the top plug and you can see the neutral bar in behind here our neutrals are connected up top the neutral I should say for this circuit is connected on this neutral bar and the ground of course right down here on the panel tub the green terminals right connected to the top of the panel which is your ground wire of course so a three wire cable white red and black with the ground that's how you connect it in the panel I'll show you how those kitchen circuits are hooked so again these are no longer allowed in new construction for a kitchen receptacle the way you'd wire a circuit in the kitchen however like I mentioned it's very useful say in your shop or garage where you'd have two circuits on one duplex receptacle or duplex outlet so to wire these I'm just going to show you quick here stripping the neutral first putting it into my stripper ending a nice loop on it same with my hot red conductor one of the hots and a nice loop using my little loop bender on my t stripper and the black wire as well strip it put it in the hole give it a nice Bend and we're ready to connect the receptacle now the here's the mistake that most people make and the most critical thing to remember about split receptacles lots of people have emailed me or asked me questions on my on the comments section of the YouTube channel or emailed me directly saying I've replaced by kitchen receptacles I did everything right but when I turn on the breaker I get a dead short and the breaker trips well let me tell you what you did you forgot to split the tab I'm going to show you that as soon as we flip this receptacle over and do the hot side so your ground is on neutral goes to one of the silver terminals nice and tight now you might not want to use an electric drill for this because if you're if you're not skilled with that drill you might over tighten and strip the terminals but I like to use them use a drill for my terminating my devices so I also turned in the non used terminal on the white side that's always a good practice now we flip it over here's the problem that most people run into again I'm gonna put my red wire on the top my black wire on the bottom but if you remember looking in the panel we've got two sides of that panel we've got both hot wires 240 volt basically on these two conductors so if you don't split this tab here you can see the tab between the two terminals you turn on that breaker you've got a dead short so that's some biggest mistake most people make when trying to replace a worn or broken receptacle in their kitchen they forget to look at how the old one had that tab split let me just show you how we do that using a needlenose plier is probably the best tool for it you just grab onto it bend it back and forth a few times and it breaks off so there's the tab so now you've got a split between here so what you have is 120 on the red wire 120 volts on the black wire you do have 240 between those but because they're split now you're allowed to have that allows you to have one thing plugged into the top half and the other thing plugged into the bottom half and they're using two separate 15 amp circuits what happens on the neutral is your neutral will carry only the unbalanced load now so if you're putting a you've got a an appliance on one phase that's all that's drawing say 12 amps and something on the other phase the black wire is drawing 12 the Reds drawing ten amps that neutral is only gonna carry two amps back to the panel that's the unbalanced load so that's why these are a nice useful circuit you can't overload them because the worst you can do is have the neutral and the hot current balanced using only one half of the duplex receptacle and that's how that works so again the biggest takeaway from this if you're replacing a kitchen receptacle don't forget to split that tab so now here we have a new installation that we can have something plugged into the top something into the bottom on two separate circuits we'll put all this together and turn that breaker back on okay turning back on that two pole fifteen amp breaker will use my plug tester and you see the circuits wired correctly that one's working no one's working as further the guide on the plug tester tells you what the o2 lights lit that means the circuit is okay and I'll show you now what I mean by 240 volts and at that receptacle check in each side let's see by fluke meter here one sides got 120 the other sides got 120 volt now I'll leave my hot wire in on the top half a hot lead and plugging into the other side you can see we've got 240 between the two but 120 on each circuit with the unbalanced load on the neutral so thanks for watching and don't forget to Like and subscribe to my channel here at YouTube also check out my website at electrical - online.com there's much more information there as well as our store where you can purchase the basics of household wiring this is available in a DVD or as an instant download and it's simply the best electrical educational program there is on the market we also have my course available now at udemy.com that's ude my dot-com it's called learn the basics of household wiring it's a fully comprehensive course that'll help you understand your home's electrical system and make you a more safe and competent weekend wiring warrior thanks again I'm Terry Peterman the Internet electrician

Channel: Terry Peterman

Views: 427,700

Keywords: receptacle, plugs, split receptacles, split plugs, kitchen receptacles, kitchen circuits, split receptacle circuit, 3-wire circuit

Id: rapPtMscrI0

Length: 8min 37sec (517 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 11 2018