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OT home wiring

I know that are a lots of electrical types out there so a quick OT question.

Stopped by a friend's cottage and she asked me if I would add a circuit in her garage so she can have a freezer etc..

It's a really old cottage. The mains are not the basic lay out. The neutral and ground buses are on top of each other and what I found strange is that all of the ground and neutral returns for a given circuit go to the same bus. That is the neutral and ground is wrapped and returned to one bus or the other. No rhyme or reason as far as I can tell. She thinks I'm an electrical genius because she listens to an old pair of two-way speakers I made years ago(hehe). I don't want to break the spell. What's up? What do I do now?

(yaya, I know-call an electrician)

TIA
I remain,
clueless
clueless OP
763 posts
 
Thanks much Gs.
I guess the handful Ive looked at have run g/n separate amd the basic books seem to show it that way too. Good to know.
I won't waste time changeing em.
I remain,
alexanderj
139 posts
 
The grounds and neutrals often go to the same buss. The exception is that when connecting to a subpanel then they are required to be connected to seperate ground and neutral busses.

I would recommend against using ground fault protection on the freezer recepticle. Any sort of motor is easily capable of tripping a gfi (usually during shutdown) and you don't want a refrigerator or freezer losing power because of a false trip. For a test, plug a vacuum cleaner into one of your gfi's and see how often the gfi trips when you switch off the vacuum. Use a (non gfi) single recepticle for the freezer (it can't be a duplex) and provide a seperate gfi protected recepticle for the required general use recepticle.
clueless OP
763 posts
 
Hi Alex:
Thank you for the input.
Is it code that it can't be a duplex? I don't think the freezer need a sep. circuit.
bigdope9
3 posts
 

Please, PLEASE take this advice: If you are not 100% familiar with the NEC and residential wiring practices, hire a licensed electrician! Wiring is NOT a HOBBY!! As a licensed home inspector and electrical inspector I have seen hundreds of homes wired with dangerous handy-man wiring, and several instances of past electrical fires! It only takes one mistake and one set of circumstances to cause terrible loss or even death! Clueless, I strongly advise you to invest the $125 or so for a professional to add your extra desired circuit. Gs, no offense, but your description of wiring practices and electrical to me wreaks of handy-man caliber knowledge. You should be careful to whom you give residential electrical installation guidelines to!
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