![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
The case of the flickering bulb
Mar. 31st, 2012 09:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gigletI replaced a ceiling-mounted light fixture today, but it has me worried.
It's wired as though it was controlled from 2 switches, but there is only one switch for it. There has been only one switch for it for at least the last 30 years. God knows what was there before that. (The house was built around the 1930s, and uses cloth-covered wire. The old wire connections are soldered together, then encased in something like bakelite, the wrapped in copious cloth-based tape.) I installed the new light fixture, rewrapped the wires, was exceedingly careful to cover any potentially exposed wires. It works fine.
But when the switch is off, there's still some power to the light -- not enough to light an incandescent, but enough to make a compact fluorescent blink.
This is not, near as I can tell, anything that I could have done when working on the fixture. The circuit should be open and there should be no current flowing when the switch is off. But that's clearly not the case.
What the heck? I have no clue what's going on there, but it's making me twitchy. I have possibly paranoid fears of an intermittent short someplace in the walls that could burn down the house.
Any clues?
It's wired as though it was controlled from 2 switches, but there is only one switch for it. There has been only one switch for it for at least the last 30 years. God knows what was there before that. (The house was built around the 1930s, and uses cloth-covered wire. The old wire connections are soldered together, then encased in something like bakelite, the wrapped in copious cloth-based tape.) I installed the new light fixture, rewrapped the wires, was exceedingly careful to cover any potentially exposed wires. It works fine.
But when the switch is off, there's still some power to the light -- not enough to light an incandescent, but enough to make a compact fluorescent blink.
This is not, near as I can tell, anything that I could have done when working on the fixture. The circuit should be open and there should be no current flowing when the switch is off. But that's clearly not the case.
What the heck? I have no clue what's going on there, but it's making me twitchy. I have possibly paranoid fears of an intermittent short someplace in the walls that could burn down the house.
Any clues?
