New Location - Grounding problems please help

Wow guys its been a bit since I've posted here but I'm in dire need.

I recently moved, and I found out since its an older house that none (none! lol) of the outlets are grounded. Playing with electricity in the past, this scares me but it seems to have worked for years with only a few hazards

My question - what do I have to do to plug in my 1000 or 600 watt hps? Is a grounded outlet vitally important to this? I would assume....

So what can I do? Ground the outlet to an outside stake or the cold water pipe? Would installing a GFCI work??

Thanks for the help... let me know if anyone has had any experience in this....

Installing a GFCI on each circut would work.
But if if it's your house (not renting) you might want to have an electrician give it a look. Grounding to the pipe or stake might work, but only if the wiring in the house supports it either in conduit or the 3rd ground wire. If the wiring itself doesn't support it, your only option probably is gfci

Just run an outlet from the breaker box on its own breaker

I could do that, unfortunately my room is on the other side of the box... Has anyone done the cold water pipe? I have on exposed in a bedroom actually that could be handy to ground to. The breaker box is kind of old and scares me actually lol

Pullin weeds, sounds good to me too, GFCIs are normally even safer than grounds.. But does that fix a spike in a lightening storm? Surges are bad lol.

If you don't know anything about electricity then don't screw with anything. You'll either burn your house down or electrocute yourself.
Since the house is old it may not have ground lines, which without rewiring the entire line you can't have a ground.

Ground wires are what cause the breaker to trip in newer houses. You don't need one so much, but your chance of a fire is increased by not using the ground. Also increased chance of electrocuting yourself.

I've run 150W hps on this.


Never used it with a 1000W though.

Basically cuts out the ground. While still powering current.

Oh yeah and if you do this always unplug it when messing with it. Taking the ground out will increase the chance of you being electrocuted. It should work fine with the ground adapter, they only cost like 50 cents.

scragelynugz said:

Pullin weeds, sounds good to me too, GFCIs are normally even safer than grounds.. But does that fix a spike in a lightening storm? Surges are bad lol.

Click to expand...

No, I don't believe that a GFCI offers any surge protection.
Just can't have it all can we?