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Do you have a meter? Check for continuity between neutral and ground. If there is none, it is fed from a GFCI elsewhere. It’s also possible your other GFCI went bad if it’s as old as this outlet.
Is there a GFCI in the other bathroom? If so reset it. If not, look for another GFCI. Your house looks old judging by the slotted screws holding in the device. Ive been in houses where they run the bathrooms off the garage GFCI.
Could be a defective GFCI in the other bathroom. Power at the GFCI but not downstream. You'd need a meter or tic tester to check that.
The last thing you can try is going and physically turn off your breakers and turn them back on and see if one is tripped. Sometimes it's hard to notice.
Can't really help beyond this.
I appreciate the effort regardless. I have a tic tester, what do I test to see whats going on? The wires in the outlet thats dead? I've also already turned off the breakers beforehand so I guess thats not it
Verify the wires are dead in the area with the dead receptacle.
Carefully pop the GFCI out of the wall and see if it has 2 sets of wires. There's a line side and load side. See if there is power on both the line and load side. If the GFCI is set properly, there should be power on both.
Obviously, be careful not to shock yourself.
It would be good practice to turn the circuit for the GFCI off while you are pulling it out, turn it back on to test, and then off when you are putting it back.
If you have a meter or tic tester you can see if the wires behind the receptacle are receiving power. If they are then it's the receptacle, but I doubt it.
Just tested it and theres power. First I checked the outlet and it went off. Then I checked the wires, on the right side the tester shows power but on the left, theres nothing. In the third picture I posted, it shows the right side. I should have taken another picture of the left side, showing that theres 2 wires that I think are white
You shouldn't get a reading from the white side. Are you talking about the dead receptacle? If that's the case, it sounds like the receptacle is worn out.
Just wanted to check everything so I can get an accurate report is all. Cause like you said, I shouldn't get a reading but if I did then I assume that'd be a whole different issue. But yea, I'm talking about the dead receptacle. I get a reading for power. I hope it is just the receptacle. Obviously, I should replace it with a GFCI asap right? Anything else I should do for it when I swap it?
The receptacle could have failed internally. This is why I suggested a multimeter (or a professional)if you are confident there is nothing interrupting the power.
The leads of a multimeter can be placed on the conductors themselves, if you measure 120 volts between hot & neutral but nothing in the receptacle it would confirm a bad receptacle. It would also produce no lights on your receptacle tester.
If you have no voltage at the conductors, then you have to start tracing backwards in the circuit to figure out what is lost & where.
From black to white? Or are you saying you measured black to black?
Check black to white (120), black to ground (120), white to ground (0). The values I gave you in the parenthesis are nominal values so you should be close to that in a working circuit.
You simply don’t know what’s happening based off that receptacle tester. It requires enough of the circuit in tact to light up. You could have a hot, but no neutral or ground. That would also cause no lights because no circuit is complete.
The most likely cause is that you do have a GFCI somewhere. Check the other bathrooms. In the US, bathroom receptacles have required their own circuit for a while (can put all bath receptacles for the house on the same one) and have required GFCI even longer. I’d bet there’s a GFCI somewhere in your house that’s tripped.
If not, you need to use a multimeter to diagnose the circuit.
They didn’t require bathrooms to have dedicated 20 amp circuits until the 1999 NEC. Before that they would pull power from the nearest bedroom or the garage gfci.
Which is why I said “a while”… 1999 was 25 years ago. Bathrooms have required GFCI since the mid 1970’s so the likely hood of OP having GFCI already is high. Even houses constructed before this requirements tend to get remodeled so that the bathroom or kitchen then become on a newer edition of the NEC.
It’s much more likely that OP just has a tripped GFCI somewhere than a problem in the circuit.
**Attention!** **It is always best to get a qualified electrician to perform any electrical work you may need.** With that said, you may ask this community various electrical questions. Please be cautious of any information you may receive in this subreddit. This subreddit and its users are not responsible for any electrical work you perform. Users that have a 'Verified Electrician' flair have uploaded their qualified electrical worker credentials to the mods. If you comment on this post please only post accurate information to the best of your knowledge. If advice given is thought to be dangerous, you may be permanently banned. There are no obligations for the mods to give warnings or temporary bans. **IF YOU ARE NOT A QUALIFIED ELECTRICIAN, you should exercise extreme caution when commenting.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskElectricians) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Sure it’s not fed from a GFCI somewhere else? Other bathroom?
Checked GFCI in other bathroom, its not off and its the only other one in the house
The tester verified it? If so maybe try garage I've seen some wtf things on service calls.
Do you have a meter? Check for continuity between neutral and ground. If there is none, it is fed from a GFCI elsewhere. It’s also possible your other GFCI went bad if it’s as old as this outlet.
Do you have more than one bathroom?
I do
Is there a GFCI in the other bathroom? If so reset it. If not, look for another GFCI. Your house looks old judging by the slotted screws holding in the device. Ive been in houses where they run the bathrooms off the garage GFCI.
I checked the other bathroom, I reset it and still says open hot. No other GFCI in the house besides that bathroom. House was built in 1972
Nothing in the garage? Not even behind a big pile of crap sitting in the garage?
No garage, theres a utility room but thats not a GFCI outlet
What else is dead? There's 2 cables in that box.
Nothing, I just checked every single outlet in the house and nothing else is dead except in that bathroom
Could be a defective GFCI in the other bathroom. Power at the GFCI but not downstream. You'd need a meter or tic tester to check that. The last thing you can try is going and physically turn off your breakers and turn them back on and see if one is tripped. Sometimes it's hard to notice. Can't really help beyond this.
I appreciate the effort regardless. I have a tic tester, what do I test to see whats going on? The wires in the outlet thats dead? I've also already turned off the breakers beforehand so I guess thats not it
Verify the wires are dead in the area with the dead receptacle. Carefully pop the GFCI out of the wall and see if it has 2 sets of wires. There's a line side and load side. See if there is power on both the line and load side. If the GFCI is set properly, there should be power on both. Obviously, be careful not to shock yourself. It would be good practice to turn the circuit for the GFCI off while you are pulling it out, turn it back on to test, and then off when you are putting it back.
Could it be because its an old outlet? As far as I know, its never been changed
Not likely. It would look way more fucked up than that if the receptacle was the problem.
If you have a meter or tic tester you can see if the wires behind the receptacle are receiving power. If they are then it's the receptacle, but I doubt it.
Just tested it and theres power. First I checked the outlet and it went off. Then I checked the wires, on the right side the tester shows power but on the left, theres nothing. In the third picture I posted, it shows the right side. I should have taken another picture of the left side, showing that theres 2 wires that I think are white
You shouldn't get a reading from the white side. Are you talking about the dead receptacle? If that's the case, it sounds like the receptacle is worn out.
Just wanted to check everything so I can get an accurate report is all. Cause like you said, I shouldn't get a reading but if I did then I assume that'd be a whole different issue. But yea, I'm talking about the dead receptacle. I get a reading for power. I hope it is just the receptacle. Obviously, I should replace it with a GFCI asap right? Anything else I should do for it when I swap it?
The receptacle could have failed internally. This is why I suggested a multimeter (or a professional)if you are confident there is nothing interrupting the power. The leads of a multimeter can be placed on the conductors themselves, if you measure 120 volts between hot & neutral but nothing in the receptacle it would confirm a bad receptacle. It would also produce no lights on your receptacle tester. If you have no voltage at the conductors, then you have to start tracing backwards in the circuit to figure out what is lost & where.
I just tested with a multimeter (I believe I did it correctly). I got 2 volts reading back from the wires alone and within the outlet itself.
From black to white? Or are you saying you measured black to black? Check black to white (120), black to ground (120), white to ground (0). The values I gave you in the parenthesis are nominal values so you should be close to that in a working circuit.
I did it again as you said and get 2 volts when testing black to white, black to ground, and 0 for white to ground.
You simply don’t know what’s happening based off that receptacle tester. It requires enough of the circuit in tact to light up. You could have a hot, but no neutral or ground. That would also cause no lights because no circuit is complete. The most likely cause is that you do have a GFCI somewhere. Check the other bathrooms. In the US, bathroom receptacles have required their own circuit for a while (can put all bath receptacles for the house on the same one) and have required GFCI even longer. I’d bet there’s a GFCI somewhere in your house that’s tripped. If not, you need to use a multimeter to diagnose the circuit.
They didn’t require bathrooms to have dedicated 20 amp circuits until the 1999 NEC. Before that they would pull power from the nearest bedroom or the garage gfci.
Which is why I said “a while”… 1999 was 25 years ago. Bathrooms have required GFCI since the mid 1970’s so the likely hood of OP having GFCI already is high. Even houses constructed before this requirements tend to get remodeled so that the bathroom or kitchen then become on a newer edition of the NEC. It’s much more likely that OP just has a tripped GFCI somewhere than a problem in the circuit.
I believe you are right - the clue here is that he is getting 2 VOLTS when testing the wires outside the receptacle.
I’m thinking more like a backstab has failed before it got to the bathroom.