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I am trying to add an outlet behind my tv by picking off the outlet below it. When I took off the outlet cover I noticed its in the middle of a run and the builder (house built in 2000) had used 14-3 Romex. I'm a bit confused since its not tied to any switches. There are two lines of Romex coming into holes in the box, so each twist is bundling three wires (two hots + pigtail) and (two neutrals + pigtail), same with the ground.

I want to run 14-2 Romex out the top of the box to my new tv outlet and I'm wondering:

A. Can I just attach the new new Romex to the sides of the duplex outlet? (Of course I'd have to bundle the grounds).

B. Or should I just get new twists (yellow? beige?) that accommodate 4 wires and attach the new Romex that way, instead of connecting to the outlet?

C. Is it even safe to have this much wire stuffed into a single box? Thanks for any advice.

Photos below enter image description here

enter image description here

JACK
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mattp
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1 Answers1

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From your pictures, I don't see the third conductor. Is there a red wire that we aren't seeing? From what I can see it looks like he was daisy-chaining the outlets by creating a pigtail. Since he didn't use the second set of terminals (or the first for that matter, not the way I would have done it) You can just pull power directly off the screw terminals. Just remember to attach your ground. If I'm missing something, please update your post and I will as well.

mreff555
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