I'm helping a friend put new drywall in their living room and all their outlets are the "old work" type. The ones that dont attach to joists. All the info on installing drywall I can find is for the "new work" type that nail to joists. My only idea is to kill power, take it down to the wire and install it from the outside like these boxes are supposed to. Any way to avoid that?

They should have used new work boxes. How many boxes are we talking?

If you know the general spot the box is going to be then you could cut an old work style opening into the drywall panel then as you are putting the panel up carefully pull the box assembly through the hole then use those little rear teeth to secure it.


But honestly man, they fucked up. All the boxes need to be redone with new work boxes. Don't forget to space them a half inch forward on the studs so they match the drywall board depth.

Thanks thats what I was expecting. It looks like at some point the outlets were updated from the origional ones from the 1950s and now they're redoing all the drywall so now we're in this position.

just replace the outlets?
it's not hard

>>2932723 (OP)
You could install the drywall around the existing old work boxes then re install them in the dry wall. But thats a lot of extra work for a worse outcome.

Just use new work boxes and redo the outlets. Its what, like 4 boxes maybe? Its not that much to re do correctly.