Replacing outlets in USA home - question about 3 hot/3 neutral and 2 hot + 1 red w/ 2 neutral

Question

I am replacing outlets in one of the bedrooms of a house in the north eastern USA. The replacement outlets are Lutron Claro 15A types with 2 bass screws, 2 silver screws, and a single green ground screw. The original outlets are 15A with the "backwire" style of connectors for hot and neutral sides (allowing them to carry up to four hot/neutral wires I believe).

The first outlet I replaced had 2 hot and 2 neutral wires, along with a ground pigtail. This replacement was easy and mapped directly to the Lutron outlet.

The second outlet has 3 hot and 3 neutral wires, along with a ground pigtail. For this one, can I pigtail/"combine" 2 hot -> 1 hot and 2 neutral -> 1 neutral, then connect the pigtailed ends to a brass screw and silver screw respectively? I have some Wago 221 3-way lever nuts from Home Depot - are these ok to use for this purpose?

Finally, the third outlet tested bad with the outlet tester - hot and neutral were reversed. This outlet has the bottom "plug" controlled by the single light switch (no overhead lights in this room) in the room. When I opened the outlet I confirmed the wiring is backwards (hot on silver side, neutral on brass side). This outlet also has the tab broken on the neutral side - with 2 black hot going into the top and 1 red hot going into the bottom. There are two neutrals again and a ground pigtail. For this outlet I wanted to confirm proper operation first, so I took the first original outlet I had replaced, broke the tab on the brass side and connected the wires as follows:

• 2 black hot wires into top brass side
• 1 red hot wire into bottom brass side
• 1 neutral into top silver side
• 1 neutral into bottom silver side
• ground pigtail to green screw

Is that the proper way to wire this outlet? The outlet tester tested fine - both with the switch on and off (as expected - when the switch is off the lower plug is not powered). When I replace this with a Lutron outlet - do I just need to pigtail the two black hot wires? Since there are only two neutrals and I have two silver screws on the Lutron outlet I don't think I can pigtail these.

Thanks!

Answer 1

It sounds mostly logical so far. If you want to be extra paranoid, you can turn off the circuit breaker for the room and test all the wires to make sure there isn't a 2nd circuit involved anywhere.

Since there are only two neutrals and I have two silver screws on the Lutron outlet I don't think I can pigtail these.

You may pigtail any number of wires up to the mechanical limit of your splicing devices. That includes even one wire if you need an extension to work with.

If you're saying the neutral side tab is absent and you have only one circuit involved, the best and easiest connection requires two little pigtails going to the two neutral terminals and spliced to the two neutrals coming from the cables. So 4 wires in one wago making them all spliced together.

If you are limited to the wago 221 parts then you will have to run a wire between two wagos to get them spliced. Or you can get bigger wagos. Or you can get a $1 receptacle that is shiny new and only needs one neutral connection.