If the light switch has a screw for a bare ground wire but your electrical box doesnt have one youre ok just leaving that screw empty and connecting your other wires to the hot screws. How to add a ground wire to a light switch.
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How to ground a light switch. Locate the ground wire coming from your homes electrical box where the light fixture is to be installed. This wire is sometimes red. The black hot wire goes to the brass screw or into the hole in the back of the device on the same side as the brass screw. A neutral wire a hot wire and a neutral wire. If your electrical cables have metal sheathing that runs all the way to the panel the sheathing can serve as a ground path. In many cases especially in older houses with metal boxes the metal box may be grounded even if you dont have a ground wire.
The green or bare copper ground wire if the device has one attaches to the green screw terminal on the switch or to the electrical box. To achieve this i cut two pigtails which are simply short lengths of conductors six inches that connect one thing to another inside a junction box. Crimp the bare ground wires together with a. If you dont have a grounding wire running to your light switches theres not much you can do about it because you probably live in a home that didnt require grounding wires to be connected to. Do this to the ground wire bef. If the wire is covered with green insulation you will need to strip 12 inch of the green insulation off of the tip of the wire.
When i took apart the light switch i notice i only had a neutral wire and a hot wire. Alternatively you might consider connecting the ground terminal to a water pipe by means of an exposed ground wire. The ground wire will be either green or bare copper wire. Dont rely on metal sheathing or an exposed ground wire. Splice the white wires together by twisting the ends together clockwise using pliers. I need to install an automatic light switch that requires three wires.
Screw on a wire cap to hold them together and insulate the ends. We also need a ground wire connecting the light switch to the other ground wires.
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