In article ,
wrote:
Everytime I visit some one in a hospital or nursing home, or go into a
doctors office I see orange colored outlets lately. I know this is a
special grade of outlet made for medical use. What I do not know is
what is special about them? Are they just made more durable, or do
they contain some sort of special protection such as a GFCI (no push
buttons on them).


Orange outlets are Isolated Ground (IG), meaning that the ground pins on the
outlets are isolated from the mounting yoke. They are used for equipment
that may be sensitive to stray currents on the ground wire, such as computers
and medical equipment. They will normally be wired with a dedicated ground
wire back to the ground bus in the panel, known as Star Grounding. The idea
is that the grounds are tied together at a single location, with a single
ground path, in order to reduce noise induced on the ground bus.

IG outlets are designated by a triangle on the face of the outlet, and are
normally orange in color, but not always.

IG outlets are not always Hospital Grade, which is a separate rating, but
are generally at least Commercial Grade, if not Specification Grade.

Hospital Grade outlets are designated by a green dot on the face, and
may, but are not required to be IG.

You may also see blue outlets, which are frequently Surge Protection,
or yellow outlets, which are normally Corrosion Resistant. The Surge
Protection outlets may also be IG.

Other colors generally have no special meaning, although you sometimes see
red used for emergency power circuits.



--
-- Welcome My Son, Welcome To The Machine --
Bob Vaughan | techie @ tantivy.net |
| P.O. Box 19792, Stanford, Ca 94309 |
-- I am Me, I am only Me, And no one else is Me, What could be simpler? --

On 22-Oct-2005, (Bob Vaughan) wrote:

Orange outlets are Isolated Ground (IG), meaning that the ground pins on the
outlets are isolated from the mounting yoke. They are used for equipment
that may be sensitive to stray currents on the ground wire, such as computers
and medical equipment.

That's interesting - thanks for the info. Does that mean that the mounting
yoke and box are separately grounded or are they not grounded?

I've only noticed orange outlets in computer environments and only for
outlets guaranteed to have power in a blackout - that's what I always
thought the colour meant. Now I know better.

Mike

Everything is grounded, even the threads for the machine screw
that holds the cover plate. It should be noted that the higher
grade receptacles have steel frames and the "plastic" parts are
nylon. There is a reason for the cost difference between receps
costing over $15 wholesale and $.69 retail at the Borg.

(top posted for your convenience)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Keep the whole world singing . . . .
DanG (remove the sevens)




"Michael Daly" wrote in message
...

On 22-Oct-2005, (Bob Vaughan) wrote:

Orange outlets are Isolated Ground (IG), meaning that the
ground pins on the
outlets are isolated from the mounting yoke. They are used for
equipment
that may be sensitive to stray currents on the ground wire,
such as computers
and medical equipment.

That's interesting - thanks for the info. Does that mean that
the mounting
yoke and box are separately grounded or are they not grounded?

I've only noticed orange outlets in computer environments and
only for
outlets guaranteed to have power in a blackout - that's what I
always
thought the colour meant. Now I know better.

Mike

wrote in message
...
On Sat, 22 Oct 2005 10:13:08 +0000 (UTC),
(Bob Vaughan) wrote:

In article ,
[stuff snipped....]

You may also see blue outlets, which are frequently Surge Protection,
or yellow outlets, which are normally Corrosion Resistant. The Surge
Protection outlets may also be IG.

Other colors generally have no special meaning, although you sometimes see
red used for emergency power circuits.

Thanks for the detailed info. Interesting reading. Having worked
mostly on residential wiring, I never knew there were all these
special types of outlets. Next time I am at one of these places I
will have to look for the triangle and/or green dot.
I wouldn't mind getting a few of those surge protection outlets for my
computer and electronics at home. Seems like thwey would be better
than power strip protectors.....

Mark

The blue outlets do not provide surge protection in the outlets, I believe
the blue means they are connected to surge protection circuitry.

A place I worked at before used red outlets throughout the building for the
computer equipment circuits. Kept someone from plugging in a vacuum cleaner
or space heater into the same line as a server (at least in theory).


- Mike O.

In article ,
Mike O'Donnell wrote:

wrote in message
.. .
On Sat, 22 Oct 2005 10:13:08 +0000 (UTC),
(Bob Vaughan) wrote:

In article ,
[stuff snipped....]

You may also see blue outlets, which are frequently Surge Protection,
or yellow outlets, which are normally Corrosion Resistant. The Surge
Protection outlets may also be IG.

Other colors generally have no special meaning, although you sometimes see
red used for emergency power circuits.

Thanks for the detailed info. Interesting reading. Having worked
mostly on residential wiring, I never knew there were all these
special types of outlets. Next time I am at one of these places I
will have to look for the triangle and/or green dot.
I wouldn't mind getting a few of those surge protection outlets for my
computer and electronics at home. Seems like thwey would be better
than power strip protectors.....

Mark

The blue outlets do not provide surge protection in the outlets, I believe
the blue means they are connected to surge protection circuitry.

Right.. I had a bit of brainfade there.
I have used some distribution panels where the outlets were color coded
to match the phases (black, red, blue).

Lets amend that to say that if the outlet is blue Decora or Quad style,
then it is a TVSS (transient voltage surge supression) type, and if it
is a standard style, it is not a TVSS device, although it may be connected
to one.

A search of the manufacturers catalogs and websites seems to confirm this.

Bryant (now part of Hubbell) markets a line of surge suppression (TVSS)
receptacles that are available in blue, brown, gray, ivory, white in
Decora style, and in blue and ivory in their Quadplex style.
The catalog page shows the example in blue.
These are all IG, and Industrial or Hospital grade, nylon or Lexan.

Leviton markets a line of surge supression outlets in orange (IG), white,
ivory, gray, red, but not blue. Leviton does not appear to offer blue
outlets. (at least not in the printed catalog that I have in front of me.)

Pass & Seymour/Legrand, and Cooper also offer TVSS receptacles in various
colors, including blue.


Bryant, Hubbell, and Cooper also offer standard 5-20R or 5-15R duplex
receptacles in blue, but those appear to be the only non-TVSS examples
that I can find in blue.



A place I worked at before used red outlets throughout the building for the
computer equipment circuits. Kept someone from plugging in a vacuum cleaner
or space heater into the same line as a server (at least in theory).


- Mike O.

In theory :-)
In reality, color dosen't do much if the person running the vacumn cleaner
dosen't know what the colors are supposed to mean.






--
-- Welcome My Son, Welcome To The Machine --
Bob Vaughan | techie @ tantivy.net |
| P.O. Box 19792, Stanford, Ca 94309 |
-- I am Me, I am only Me, And no one else is Me, What could be simpler? --

"Bob Vaughan" wrote in message
...
In article ,
wrote:
Everytime I visit some one in a hospital or nursing home, or go into a
doctors office I see orange colored outlets lately. I know this is a
special grade of outlet made for medical use. What I do not know is
what is special about them? Are they just made more durable, or do
they contain some sort of special protection such as a GFCI (no push
buttons on them).


Orange outlets are Isolated Ground (IG), meaning that the ground pins on
the
outlets are isolated from the mounting yoke. They are used for equipment
that may be sensitive to stray currents on the ground wire, such as
computers
and medical equipment. They will normally be wired with a dedicated ground
wire back to the ground bus in the panel, known as Star Grounding. The
idea
is that the grounds are tied together at a single location, with a single
ground path, in order to reduce noise induced on the ground bus.

IG outlets are designated by a triangle on the face of the outlet, and are
normally orange in color, but not always.

IG outlets are not always Hospital Grade, which is a separate rating, but
are generally at least Commercial Grade, if not Specification Grade.

Hospital Grade outlets are designated by a green dot on the face, and
may, but are not required to be IG.

You may also see blue outlets, which are frequently Surge Protection,
or yellow outlets, which are normally Corrosion Resistant. The Surge
Protection outlets may also be IG.

Other colors generally have no special meaning, although you sometimes see
red used for emergency power circuits.



--
-- Welcome My Son, Welcome To The Machine --
Bob Vaughan | techie @ tantivy.net |
| P.O. Box 19792, Stanford, Ca 94309 |
-- I am Me, I am only Me, And no one else is Me, What could be simpler? --

Isolated wiring is not only for protection of the equipment. If you're
having an EKG done, you don't want your arm or leg tied to earth ground. If
there were a malfunction and you were tied to ground......you might go bye
bye.

Bob

On Sat, 22 Oct 2005 21:42:11 +0000, Mike O'Donnell wrote:


wrote in message
...
On Sat, 22 Oct 2005 10:13:08 +0000 (UTC),
(Bob Vaughan) wrote:

In article ,
[stuff snipped....]

You may also see blue outlets, which are frequently Surge Protection,
or yellow outlets, which are normally Corrosion Resistant. The Surge
Protection outlets may also be IG.

Other colors generally have no special meaning, although you sometimes see
red used for emergency power circuits.

Thanks for the detailed info. Interesting reading. Having worked
mostly on residential wiring, I never knew there were all these
special types of outlets. Next time I am at one of these places I
will have to look for the triangle and/or green dot.
I wouldn't mind getting a few of those surge protection outlets for my
computer and electronics at home. Seems like thwey would be better
than power strip protectors.....

Mark

The blue outlets do not provide surge protection in the outlets, I believe
the blue means they are connected to surge protection circuitry.

A place I worked at before used red outlets throughout the building for the
computer equipment circuits. Kept someone from plugging in a vacuum cleaner
or space heater into the same line as a server (at least in theory).

At my POE, they're (red outlets) isolated circuits too. They don't want
the cleanign crew injecting anything into the grounds. In fact, the
cleaning crews also have isolated cords (big blockof plastic announcing
that they're isolated and a GFCI brick) on their equipment. There was a
time they'd reach into the back of computers to grab power. A few crashes
taught a big lesson.

--
Keith

Michael Daly ) said...

That's interesting - thanks for the info. Does that mean that the mounting
yoke and box are separately grounded or are they not grounded?

I've only noticed orange outlets in computer environments and only for
outlets guaranteed to have power in a blackout - that's what I always
thought the colour meant. Now I know better.

The yoke and the mounting screws are grounded through the box's normal
ground connection, but there is an extra INSULATED grounding conductor
that connects to the ground screw on the outlet to provide the ground
for the grounding pin.

This insulated grounding conductor provides a direct connection to the
grounding point in the distribution panel, so nothing else shares the
path back as would be the case with the "normal" grounding conductor.

In an environment I used to work in, it was common practice to wire the
orange outlets with 14/3 cable. The white and black were wired to the
outlet as usual, and the bare conductor was wired to the box as usual.
The red conductor was the isolated ground and was wired to the ground
screw on the outlet.

--
Calvin Henry-Cotnam
"Never ascribe to malice what can equally be explained by incompetence."
- Napoleon
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE: if replying by email, remove "remove." and ".invalid"

wrote:
At my POE, they're (red outlets) isolated circuits too. They don't want
the cleanign crew injecting anything into the grounds. In fact, the
cleaning crews also have isolated cords (big blockof plastic announcing
that they're isolated and a GFCI brick) on their equipment. There was a
time they'd reach into the back of computers to grab power. A few crashes
taught a big lesson.

Getting power from the back of a computer is just plain wrong !!!! I'd
fire an idiot that did that......

However, plugging a vacuum into the same circuit as a computer really
should not cause problems (unless they blow the breaker). I run my
computer on the same outlets that run my vacuum, tv set, stereo, and
whatever else I plug in. Never seen any problems, except power tools
seem to make static on the computer screen and the tv, but they do
that on any circuit.

Then you get the guys who unplug the servers, plug in the vacuum, then
plug the servers back in when they're done......