This may not apply to your situation, but here's some advice I received from an electrician awhile back...

There's a couple of different ways to attach wires to a typical electrical outlet. The first way is to wrap the wires around the screw terminals (clockwise is best). The second way is to push the wire (with the end stripped a bit) into a small hole in the back of the outlet. The wire will then be gripped by a spring contact inside the outlet. Many times "pros" will use the second way, especially since it is easier and faster to wire up an outlet that way. Time is money, etc.

The problem is that these connections can become loose over time, disconnect, or connect intermittently and then get hot with current flow. This may depend on the quality of the outlet and conditions inside the box (wires bent - putting pressure on the connection, etc.).

My electrician friend told me that you'll never have any trouble with bad connections if you wrap the wires around the screw terminals...Every time I open up an outlet, I always re-do the wires and wrap them around the screws. So far, so good...I did have one that was a little intermittent before I fixed it

This may not be your issue, but I thought the info may be of value in the future....

Randy