"LurfysMa" wrote in message
...
Can anyone explain to me the electrical terms "neutral",
"ground",
"line", and "load"?
HOT: Power coming into the circuit from the electric company.
The HOT wire goes directly back to the circuit breaker in your
box and is almost always black color.
A meter would read 110Vac on it. Or 220,. depending on the
type of power/country, etc.. I'm assuming US since the
colors/terms you give are US terms.
NEUTRAL: This is the "return" path for electricity, back to the
electric company.
HOT and NEUTRAL are necessary for any electrical circuit to work
correctly and safely.
GROUND/EARTH: This is also called EARTH. And that's just what
it is. It's a wire that goes back to the ground via your breaker
box. It literally connects to the ground; the dirt around the
rod driven into the ground outside your electrical service.
While GROUND will function as a NEUTRAL, it is against codes and
UNSAFE to use it for a NEUTRAL. The GROUND is there so that if
anything goes wrong, housings, cabinets, etc., do not become
energized and dangerous to the touch. Or start fires, etc..
The EARTH wire is either green insulated, or more often just a
bare, uninsulated wire.
LOAD: That's the piece of equipment being run with the
electricity. In a circuit with a light bulb, the light bulb is
the LOAD. The HOT probably goes to a switch, then thru the
switch and to one of the bulb's connections (the center one for
an incandescent bulb). The other side of the bulb connection,
the threaded part, has the NEUTRAL connected to it, and completes
the circuit from the LOAD, back to the breaker box.
So, the LOAD is the light, motor, whatever the electicity is
powering.
It would appear that in order to use the 035, you need all three
connections: HOT, NEUTRAL, and EARTH or GROUND.
If the GROUND isn't already there, it would have to be added
in order to use the 035. Because you don't see the GROUND/EARTH
wire, don't assume it's not there. An electrician would be able
to tell quickly, though.
This is NOT a diy job for you, BTW. Either use an exact
replacement, or call in a contractor to do it right.
HTH,
Pop
I have an Aube TI034 programmable light switch that I want to
replace
with an Aube TI035 programmable light switch.
The info for the 034 is he
http://www.aubetech.com/products/pro...=77&noLangue=2
and for the 035, he
http://www.aubetech.com/products/pro...=78&noLangue=2
The reason I want to replace the 034 with the 035 is that the
035 can
handle up to 2400 watts, whereas the 034 can only handle up to
500
watts.
According to the manual, the 034 goes in just like a regular
light
switch. I've had it in there for a couple of years and it works
perfectly.
I bought an 035 and the electrician I called to install it said
that
he couldn't because, unlike the 034, the 035 required a
"neutral" in
addition to the line and the load wires. This is an old house
and
there is no neutral in that j-box.
On the web page above, it says that the connection required 3
wires
(line, load, neutral). But the installation manual (pdf file
available
on that same web page), has an installation diagram showing
only 2
wires: black (line) and white (neutral).
I am confused. Isn't "neutral" the same as "line"? I thought
that
"load" is the hot wire, "line" is the return (or neutral) wire,
and
'ground" goes to ground.
Can anyone tell me if I can install an 035 where I only have 2
wires?
Thanks
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