On Tue, 23 Mar 2021 00:35:24 -0400, Michael Trew
wrote:

On 3/21/2021 4:33 PM, J. Clarke wrote:
Please forgive me--this is a bit of a rant.

I went to put a new fixture at the top of the stairs--the old one is
physically too small to hold anything bigger than a 60w incandescent
(by physically I mean you can't put the globe on if anything bigger is
in it, and that includes CF and LED that are larger than 60W
equivalent and in that location a 60 just isn't enough light.

Well, went to kill the power to the circuit and discovered chaos.

First:
Turned the switch off
Checked socket with a voltage sensor
Still voltage on the circuit
Par for the course in this house
Switch is in the neutral leg
Add to list of stuff to fix.

Next:
Screwed adapter into socket and plugged in tracer
Traced signal in breaker panel
Not one, but _two_ breakers showed signal
Turned both off
Went back upstairs
Checked for voltage again
No voltage--good
Flipped switch--checked again
Voltage--not good
Back to the panel
Identify third breaker, turn off
Now no voltage

Replaced fixture, turned breakers back on, everything works, I didn't
die.

But now I have the real mystery--how is this effing light managing to
be connected to not one, but _three_ separate branch circuits?

Every time someone tells me that wiring should be done by a
"professional" I run into another example of egregiously bad wiring
installed by a "professional".

Well, I know now how I'm going spend some part of my vacation. And I
hate to admit it but I'm getting too _old_ to be rolling around in
fiberglass pulling wires for fun and no profit. I know, I should hire
an electrician but then I'll have to watch him.



I had a similar issue that I traced to a poorly grounded connection
inside of a metal junction box in my basement ceiling... someone thought
it was a good idea to put two separate circuits into this same junction
box, practically touching, wrapped loosely in electrical tape... who
needs wire nuts? No splicing tape and solder? Electric tape to the
rescue... haha. It was causing like a 40 volt leak onto another circuit.
That's what I was getting at with checking where the neutrals were
connected and making sure they were not just connected to each other
without a solid connection to the actual neutral