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We're installing a cabinet with a double oven over where an outlet used to be. We've capped off the wires and will install a plate over them, but is that good enough if we put the cabinet in front of it and install the oven? It's directly behind the oven, but there's a small hole in the back of the cabinet, behind the oven.

How should we change it if that is not enough to be within code?

(In Mesa, Arizona. The outlet seems to be mid-line. It used to be an above-counter outlet for small appliances.)

J Parker
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The answer will depend on whether or not the outlet you're covering up was in the middle of a line of devices, or at the end.

If the outlet box was at the end of a line (i.e. there is only one cable entering the box), you will be OK covering up the box as long as you disconnect the wires that serve the box from upstream. (Also, as suggested in the comments on the original question, it would be helpful to add a label or note stating that the circuit is abandoned.)

If the outlet box was in the middle of a line of devices (i.e. one cable comes in from the box upstream and one or more cables leave the box to feed devices downstream), then that box is serving as a junction box and it is not legal to permanently install an appliance in front of it. NEC states that a junction box cover must be accessible at all times without tools. Thus, a cabinet door is OK, but an oven that you'll have to unmount is not.

If it is a junction box, you will need to find a way to rewire the circuit so that that junction box can be eliminated or moved to somewhere accessible.

ThisOneGoesToEleven
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