Hi, I've been replacing the outlets and switches in my 60s home. I am a novice, but I have done about 3/4 of the outlets and switches. I've run into some strange wiring, and even managed to fix a 3 way switch (after I screwed it up). Anyway, today I was replacing the double switches in both bathrooms. The first bathroom had 4 sets of cables. The whites were wirenut'd together, the 4 black wires were attached one each on the top and bottom of each switch (4 screws, 4 black wires). Then there was a short piece of white wire which went from the bottom of switch 1 to bottom of switch 2. I replaced those two switches using the exact same configuration and everything works fine. The second bathroom has 5 sets of cables. (5?!?) Again, the whites were wirenut'd together, but this time the top of switch #2 had two black wires attached (5 black wires, 4 screws). Then there was, again, a short piece of white wire which went from the bottom of switch 1 to the [I]top[/I] of switch 2. Well, I am installing Leviton Decora switches, and there is no way I can get 3 wires around that screw. I see no holes in back to stick the wires in. So...I put the short white wire from the bottom of switch 1 to the bottom of switch 2. Both switches work (light and fan). However, the outlet on the other side of the wall shows an open ground. I confess, I am not really sure what that means. Now, I did not check that outlet before I started...my bad...so I'm wondering, did I screw up the outlet with that short piece of white wire in the switches? If so, how can I configure this short white wire without having to put 3 pieces of wire on one screw? (I could probably pigtail them together and attach, but I'd rather not do that if there's an alternate configuration.) I'm about to replace both outlets with GFCIs (have already done this in the kitchen and first bathroom). But I don't want to start that until I know I've done the switches correctly. I'll attempt to attach two pictures. One is a picture of the double switch before I disconnected everything. The second is my diagram of the double switch before I disconnected everything. The circles are the 5 sets of cables in roughly the position they are in the outlet box. The solid lines are the 5 black wires. The 5 white wires coming from those cables are not shown in the diagram. The dotted line is the short piece of white wire. If you can tell me a configuration that would work, or confirm the outlet is not related, I would be most appreciative. Thank you for any help! [ATTACH]73619[/ATTACH] [ATTACH]73618[/ATTACH]

We recently moved into a new home. We went to setup Christmas lights for the first time and discovered that NONE of the outdoor electrical outlets work. It was evident after a little troubleshooting that they were all daisy chained together. The outlet on the back porch goes to the outlet on the front porch, which goes to the outlet on the side of the house, which goes to a GFCI outlet in the garage, which goes to the breaker box in the garage. It seems that the GFCI outlet in the garage will trip itself ever 30 minutes despite the fact that nothing is plugged into ANY of the 4 outlets. To make things ever STRANGER, when we reset the GFCI, the GFCI outlet always registers power, but the outdoor outlets still have trouble. I tried to troubleshoot to a single bad outlet somewhere along the chain, but instead I found that the problem lies with the outdoor outlet covers, yes..... the COVERS! If I screw the cover on tight, the outlet doesn't work. If I loosen the cover, they work just fine. Don't believe me? Check out this video I shot highlighting the problem: [url]https://youtu.be/JgCN2uE4YN8[/url] As you can see, I tighten the cover on the outlet stops working. Why would this be? I really hope someone has an explanation for this craziness.