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Hi there,
I'm living in a "built in the sixties" bungalow, and I decided to get rid of the bathroom wall fixture and put pot lights in the bathroom ceiling.
Be prepared. This is a long story.
Faced with the prospect of banging holes in the (plaster) walls to find the existing fixture's wires and un-staple them from the stud, figure out how to fish them up through the wall and into the attic, and then re-use them for the pot-lights, I decided to take a look in the attic. I found one line that came out of the top plate at the spot right above the wall fixture.
"Bingo", thought I! I'll just cut the wire, leave the wires for the old wall fixture in there, put in a junction box with the live wire going into it and the new pot light wire coming out of it, and I'll be good as gold!
Fine. I removed each fuse until I found the one that controlled the existing lights in the bathroom, tested it and labelled it (this is important), then I turned off the power to the whole house, went up and cut the lone wire in the attic. Then I maretted off both ends of the wire, and turned the power back on, and tested the maretted ends of the top-plate wire for power.
Good news: one and only one side of the cut wire had power.
Bad news: it was the wrong side.
Instead of the top-plate wire being a wire that went to just the fixture, it came FROM the fixture, and went on to power another room's lights. At least I wasn't completely wrong about the circuit that the wire coming out of the top-plate belonged to, because I could pull out the fuse and get rid of the power in that wire.
So, I maretted off both ends of the wire, and sat back to think. I could put in a junction box, put the cut wire through the junction box, and add in a new wire for the pot lights, and everything should be tickety-boo. Right? Right. I'll just run out and grab a junction box, and...
Here's where my husband started demanding functional lights in the rooms involved. So I put a length of 14/2 wire in between the cut ends of the top-plate wire, maretted everything together, and then proceeded to go for a junction box.
When I got back, I pulled out the fuse, and, en route to the attic, poked my head in to confirm that the power to the bathroom was off. The fan was running. The lamp in the outlet was on. What the...?
I took out each fuse in the box, and ran back and forth to find that one that would turn off the fan and lamp. Nothing. There is no fuse I can pull out of the fuse box to make that fan and lamp turn off.
Okay, I know about the Twilight Zone, but this really freaked me out. Has ANYONE ever run into something like this? This can't make any sense. I took out the fuse, labelled it, and it consistently stopped power from coming to the bathroom before.
My dad's coming over on Monday to take a look (He says, "It has to shut off if its fuse is out." I say, "It DOESN'T." He says, "It has to.") Anyone have an idea I can try, before my dad shows up to artfully apply egg to my face? <grin>
Thanks!
I'm living in a "built in the sixties" bungalow, and I decided to get rid of the bathroom wall fixture and put pot lights in the bathroom ceiling.
Be prepared. This is a long story.
Faced with the prospect of banging holes in the (plaster) walls to find the existing fixture's wires and un-staple them from the stud, figure out how to fish them up through the wall and into the attic, and then re-use them for the pot-lights, I decided to take a look in the attic. I found one line that came out of the top plate at the spot right above the wall fixture.
"Bingo", thought I! I'll just cut the wire, leave the wires for the old wall fixture in there, put in a junction box with the live wire going into it and the new pot light wire coming out of it, and I'll be good as gold!
Fine. I removed each fuse until I found the one that controlled the existing lights in the bathroom, tested it and labelled it (this is important), then I turned off the power to the whole house, went up and cut the lone wire in the attic. Then I maretted off both ends of the wire, and turned the power back on, and tested the maretted ends of the top-plate wire for power.
Good news: one and only one side of the cut wire had power.
Bad news: it was the wrong side.
Instead of the top-plate wire being a wire that went to just the fixture, it came FROM the fixture, and went on to power another room's lights. At least I wasn't completely wrong about the circuit that the wire coming out of the top-plate belonged to, because I could pull out the fuse and get rid of the power in that wire.
So, I maretted off both ends of the wire, and sat back to think. I could put in a junction box, put the cut wire through the junction box, and add in a new wire for the pot lights, and everything should be tickety-boo. Right? Right. I'll just run out and grab a junction box, and...
Here's where my husband started demanding functional lights in the rooms involved. So I put a length of 14/2 wire in between the cut ends of the top-plate wire, maretted everything together, and then proceeded to go for a junction box.
When I got back, I pulled out the fuse, and, en route to the attic, poked my head in to confirm that the power to the bathroom was off. The fan was running. The lamp in the outlet was on. What the...?
I took out each fuse in the box, and ran back and forth to find that one that would turn off the fan and lamp. Nothing. There is no fuse I can pull out of the fuse box to make that fan and lamp turn off.
Okay, I know about the Twilight Zone, but this really freaked me out. Has ANYONE ever run into something like this? This can't make any sense. I took out the fuse, labelled it, and it consistently stopped power from coming to the bathroom before.
My dad's coming over on Monday to take a look (He says, "It has to shut off if its fuse is out." I say, "It DOESN'T." He says, "It has to.") Anyone have an idea I can try, before my dad shows up to artfully apply egg to my face? <grin>
Thanks!
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