Light Problem

[Anonymous]

I own an older house and recently needed to replace a ceiling fixture in our breakfast room(no problem with it --just decorative change.. I found the correct breaker--cut it off and disassembled the existing fixture. Since I had to do some ceiling repair before reinstalling, I wire-nutted and electrical taped off the two wires individually and then re-engaged the breaker. Everything was fine until that evening when my wife tried to turn on the wall fixture in the powder room. It had no power! This room shares a wall with the breakfast room.

My suspicion is that the two are interconnected in some way that requires the first room's ceiling fixture to be in place. BTW each room has a wall switch on the common wall, however each has only three wires (white black & ground) in their respective boxes.

Is there any logic to this? Is this common or safe?
I would appreciate any help from those who know.

Thanks

[Wgoodrich]

I suspect you have more than one cable in your light fixture box.

I am suspecting you have the following cables. Power in cable and power out cable and switch leg cable.

If you unwired all wires in that light box then you I am suspecting you killed the power out going to the next light fixture that now also is not working.

Did you unwire all the wires in that light box when you took down you light fixture?

If you did not then check the black and white wires and see if one wire didn't make it under the wire nut and is not making contact taking power out of the light fixture box without a fixture to the light fixture in the other room that you now find quit working.

Let me know what you have and find.

Good Luck

Wg

[Anonymous]

WG:
Thanks for the reply.
Today I went up and checked and found a large cable with three wires that feeds my light. One I know is hot and one I know is neutral because I checked both to a good ground source.

The third I am not sure of because it connects to another wire that leaves the box. Also the neutral that connects to the neutral in the light box also moves out in the same direction as the unknown third wire.

I suspect that the two that leave go into the second room and feed that light.

Did they use three wire cable in old homes and if the did what was the configuration? I know its not a ground wire.

Thanks

george

[Wgoodrich]

If everything was working correctly before you changed the light fixture. This leads me to believe you problem will be found in the box where you changed the light fixture. I am suspecting that you either missed a wire in that light fixture box or you may not have made a good connection with a wire under a wire nut in that light box.

Doubt you problem will be in any other boxes. The only wires that you disturbed were in the light box. That tells me your problem is in that one light box.

Open that light box up and lood for a wire that did not get connected. If all weres are connected then pull on each individual wire entering each wire nut. If one pulls out you found a bad connection in that wire nut.

Let us know what you find

Good Luck

Wg

[Anonymous]

wg:

Got a chance to work on this just before Christmas. Thanks for the advice. What I ended up with was as you suspected. One hot one neutral coming in with a continuation of each going to the second room. I'd everything--redid the connections-- and reinstalled the light. Everything seems fine now.

Thanks and Happy New Year!

george

[Wgoodrich]

Glad to hear of your success.

Congrats

Wg