Question about putting in outlet w/ three sets of wire

Question

I purchased a home recently and am looking to replace an electric range with a gas one. Currently, there is a 240v outlet for the electric range but not a 120 for the gas, so I am looking to remedy that. There is an electrical receptacle immediately behind where the range sits that isn't currently being used, so I want to put an outlet there.

I took off the wall cover and I am a bit confused by what I am seeing (picture attached). I have a bit of DIY experience with putting in outlets and switches, but nothing very complicated and I want to be sure that I do this right.

There are three sets of wire coming from different holes in the receptacle; two of them have only hot and neutral wires and the third appears to have hot, neutral and two grounds. All three sets of wires have been twisted together with their corresponding wires and capped off. Can you advise me on how to wire this in correctly?

Thank you for your time, I appreciate the help.

Answer 1

Add a fourth wire to each set - that is 4-12" long. I like 8-9". Put the wire nut back on. In fact, this is a good time to switch to red wire nuts if they're yellow.

These short wires are called pigtails. Attach them to the receptacle screws in the usual manner. You can shuck down Romex or buy THHN wire, and you need one wire of each of these:

• Ground: MUST be green, yellow/green, bare, or stripped bare. (do not strip stranded wire bare; you'll get a birdsnest.)
• Neutral: MUST be white or gray.

• Hot: MUST be any unmentioned color. OR a white/gray wire with colored tape markings near each end.

  • You can get all 3 from a white wire by stripping and remarking.
  • If you use stranded THHN, the pushing into the box will be super easy, but attaching to the receptacle will be difficult. Consider screw-and-clamp type receptacles for that.

I prefer to attach the pigtails to the receptacle first, and at a comfortable workbench. Then you only have to be in the awkward position for long enough to wire-nut. I also put stranded on terminal screws, which is hard, so better done at a bench.

Now, you have a big problem with cubic inches. This box already has 6 conductors + 1 for all grounds; at 2.25 cubic inches/wire this box is already overfull. The pigtails won't add any (pigtails are free) but the yoke (outlet) will add 2 wires' worth. So let's give ourselves some more cubic inches in a tasteful way, using a Legrand Wiremold Surface Conduit Starter Box. It's intended to surface mount and be a launch point for surface conduit, but it's good for just adding some cubic inches too.

Answer 2

As an alternative to the other answer, and to avoid the issue of box fill with the junction box you show, you could also convert your existing 240V receptacle to a 120V one for the new range (sounds like you won't have a need for the 240V one for now, right? You can always convert back later). You would need to verify that:

1. You can get a new, single pole breaker and a filler plate for your panel.
2. The wiring to the 240V receptacle has at least one black (or other color) wire, one white wire, and one ground wire (green or bare), or is run in metal conduit as a ground path.

If those are met, you could swap out the breaker (will need to use smaller gauge pigtails to connect the larger gauge wires), and swap out the receptacle (same thing - you will need pigtails). Now you will have a dedicated 120V circuit for the gas range. If you need to go back to 240V for an electric range in the future, that will be easy to do as well since you will just need to swap the breaker and receptacle back.