Electricians: Chandelier went out but it's getting current
 

Couple of months ago our family room chandelier went out cold turkey. I'm just now getting time to get to it.

I originally thought it was the switch as I bought one of those non contact voltmeters and it went crazy at t he chandelier. Took off the dimmer and it went crazy inside of the switch box also.

Replaced the switch at Lowes and NOTHING. It still went crazy at the chandelier.

Thought, "that's odd." replaced one bulb and nothing. Tried the same bulb in another room's chandelier and it worked. Any ideas? I'm hurting here for suggestions.

Replace the antifreeze in the fuse
Box?



.....I got nothing. Well, unless you'd like to accidentally electrocute yourself. I pretty sure I could do that

Man....wutamess.

you're absolutely sure it has current? you could hire an electrician but he'd probably charge you.

I've had those non-contact deals indicate power when there isn't any before. Put a real voltmeter on it. With that said, other than the switch, there isn't really much that can go wrong with a light fixture.

Lick it, like a nine volt battery. See if it is good or not.

Lost the neutral.

thats what I was gonna say, broken wire somewhere along the neutral.

Non contact voltage testers are actually inductance testers they can give a false reading due to inductance.

Yeah check voltage with a meter. Are the bulbs in series? Rare, but If so one out would cause all of them to not work. Check your switch for continuity ( remove voltage first). Bad wire in the chandelier itself, you could test the wires for continuity as well. Run a cord from the chandelier wires to an outlet and see if that lights it up.
Be careful, it's only 110 but if you fall off a ledger( eta stupid autocorrect: ladder) that could hurt you.

Get a real meter, a cheap one will work. Check hot to ground, then hot to neutral. Should get 120 both ways.

Bulbs won't be in series.

This is most common in chandeliers that are made out of cheap strands of Christmas lights.

I am a licensed master electrician. Get a ladder pull down fixture enough to see wirenuts pay particular attention to white wires. Sounds like loose wire. Nonelectricians don't twist wires I make plenty of money off of this very problem.

Going to sleep. I can walk you through all the steps in troubleshooting this problem. I will check this board in morning.

This.

You can get one at Harbor Freight or somewhere like it for 3 or 4 bucks. Hell, they'll probably give you one if you buy a hammer or something.

Just caught part about dimmer. Dimmers go bad often. Call 785 640 3126 in morning. That's my work number I will help you out.

if I understood him right, he replaced the dimmer.

If he made up new switch with power on may have "smoked" it. That's a professional term. Should not work a dimmer "hot". Instructions will verify this.

Walmart has a cheap one as well.

Yeah. I replaced the dimmer.
Had wife use the non contact thing and when I touched the wires it went crazy. When I stopped the connection it died down. I'm not an electrician but I'd touch wires for a split second and it'd go bat shit crazy. Disconnect for 3-4 seconds and do it again. Same results.

The chandelier base is about 20 feet high. Don't have a ladder that goes that high.
Replaced the old dimmer and it basically did the same as the new one. So took the new one back out because the older one was a custom one with heat syncs. Left the old one in there.

You probably want to PM him your number instead of leaving it out on the board...

it's his work #... I do the same thing with tatts. Helps with business anyways.

I am sure you are right. If I was better on a computer I would have more posts. I don't even know what PM is.

Uber... So even if the thingymabob goes bat shit crazy when it's supposed to, you still think it's the neutral problem?

With new information I believe your assessment that it is not the switch. Unfortunately most likely problem lies 20 feet up in the box.

Even if the lights themselves are showing hot?

It goes crazy because you still have a hot. Neutral can't be tested with that thing.

Ugh... so electrician needs to be called with a 20 foot ladder? :mad:

In box in ceiling you have a switched hot and neutral. If the tick tester reads at bulb when switch is on and not when its off, it is reasonable to assume you have power. Only remaining answer if this is true(need multimeter to be sure) is loose neutral in switch box, fixture box, or previous device box that is still working but not providing neutral down line to chandelier.

And informed of height. Most of us don't carry ladders that tall on our trucks. You sure its 20 foot?

How many romex cables are in the switch box? Or, does the switch have a black and a white wire? Or two black wires? If you take the two wires off the switch and touch them together (or jumper across them), does the fixture light up?

More like 15.

Sorry about your luck. Feel free to call me if you want I can tell you if you are being charged fairly. Raytown is a bit too far for me to travel. Wish I could have been more help.

one black wire and one white wire with a ground cutoff still inside the 1 romex cable.
I won't blow something if I touch them together?

Heres a pic

12 foot ladder would be sufficient. Still should be informed when you call em. Use angies list a lot of bad electricians out there.

That's what he's testing.

I can take it off right quick and see... so do it?

That white wire will be your hot the black your switched hot. You won't blow anything if you touch them together. If you replaced switch with no change then touching them won't help.

The white *should* be the hot (feed) at the switch, the black *should* be the switch leg back to the fixture. You won't blow anything up, but you'll get a small arc that might startle you. All this does is bypass the switch to eliminate that as a possible problem. I asked about the wiring because it could have been fed from the switch (two romexes) with the neutral tied together in the switch box, but it doesn't look like that's the case. If bypassing the switch and it still doesn't light, the yeah, you've probably lost the neutral (grounded conductor).

Fair enough.

Private Message. How it works is, if you move your mouse to a username on the left, and click on it, a dropdown will occur, and somewhere in that selection list will say "Send a private message to Coach" or whatever the username you click on.

So the neutral is the ground wire? the one that's tucked back inside the Romex?

You don't have a neutral at all on that switch box

Mods please move this to the "Current" events thread.

You bastards are taking food out of my kids' mouths. Just let him call me tomorrow.

I'm just kidding about that. Let him zap himself one time. He will call. He never leaves me in the house alone with his wife any more though.

Learned his lesson after one fat headed light skinned kid, eh?

Heh. I call he and his family the black Duggars. They don't even know what that means but his old lady pops out 2 kids per calendar year. I don't know how they do it.

Actually... I didn't think you did electric work Phil.
Would love to get this taken care of after work tomorrow if you can do it.

After work? Holiday rates. No problem. Text me or something. I'll be smoking some hams and stuff.

an outside chance - if it is on a dimmer and you are using neon-type bulbs - will not work. Obvious, i know...

This, I got hit with 220v because I trusted one of the damn things :cuss:

if you're ever in doubt at least use the back of your hand to touch so your reaction doesn't grab the wire, you'll just jump off it. though i suppose if you want to use that method on a 477 3 phase, you might deserve what you get.

Yeah, learned my lesson REAL quick. I went back to using my old multimeter and won't touch a wire until I check for volts just to make sure