David Martel wrote:
Lurf,

So, why couldn't your electrician do this? You have a "line" wire
bringing the electricity to the switch. You have the load wire traveling
from the switch to the lights. You have a neutral returning the electricity
from the light to the ground rod. The ground wire is a second wire
connecting to the ground rod for safety reasons.
If you need a neutral (and a ground) at the switch box and lamp box the
electrician can pull new wire. So, why won't he?

Dave M.


The switch box might contain only a hot and switched-hot with no neutral
(presumably the case here). Hopefully the electrician looked at the box
and determined this (did not make a diagnosis over the phone). If wired
with cable (Romex, BX) you can't just pull a new wire, and fishing may
be a lot of work/cost.

I hope the post by Pat was meant to be a joke. Pop's description of
terms is good but I would add that in addition to "earthing" the
"ground" wire also provides a low resistance path back to the source to
trip the circuit breaker if a "hot" connects to a grounded device or box.

bud--