KOA wrote:
In my house, none of the outlets are grounded, although they are all three
prong. I discovered an outlet which appears to have a grounding prong broken
off in it. I can't tell for sure. All I know is I can't plug in any
three-prong plug.

Is it safe to try to just yank the prong out with pliers?

Or should I just install one of those plug adapters, which convert 3-prong
to 2-prong??

The problem is, there is no way for me to remove the box, since I can never
be certain if I have turned off power to the outlet, even if I shut off the
circuit. The problem is a voltage detector cannot be plugged into the outlet
to confirm no power, since it is 3-prong. Could I just use a multimeter
instead to detect voltage? Or use a circuit finder to verify that both
outlets go to the same circuit? I can't shut off the entire house either,
since some of my circuits might run through my neighbor's circuits, so I
would have to shut off his power too.

Thanks for any help.



If all those outlets don't have stickers on them bearing the warning
"Ground not connected", you may not be in code compliance.

For all you know, someone may have deliberately shoved something in
their to deter someone else thinking it really was a grounded receptical.

FWIW, as long as you're not standing in a puddle of water or touching
something which really is grounded at the same time you go to do the
"extraction", I can't think of any reason it wouldn't be safe to pull
that broken off pin out with pliers.

HTH,

Jeff
--
Jeffry Wisnia

(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)

"Truth exists; only falsehood has to be invented."