Recessed Lighting: Wiring Puzzle--How is this Possible

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

TL;DR Summary

Recessed Lights on ONE Switch
Switch is basic ON/OFF, no dimmer nothing fancy.:
SWITCH goes ON: One light OFF rest of lights ON
SWITCH goes OFF: Light that was OFF now ON rest of lights on but dim.

Hey Everyone

OK This is BOGGLING my mind. How is it even possible? I am trying to figure it out before I look in the Jboxes of the lights.
Any ideas?

Newly installed recessed lights done by skilled electrician.
One switch controls all lights.






SWITCH goes ON: One light off rest of lights ON

SWITCH goes OFF: The light that was off goes ON and the rest go on but are dim.

Also is anyone has a really good wiring diagram for recessed lights, please share!

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

Switch is basic ON/OFF, no dimmer nothing fancy.

 

[Baluncore]

The lights have individual intelligence and cycle in brightness when momentarily switched off and on again. One light is faulty and does not reset to synchronous operation.

To test, swap a good and a bad. If the problem moves, replace that light.

 

[Rive]

Newly installed recessed lights done by skilled electrician.

Apparently, he still managed to mess up the wiring.
He messed up, he should do the cleanup/redo.
Don't touch it.

There should be three in parallel, in series with the singular one, which is shorted by the switch => quite dangerous setup.
I think he managed to connect one of the wires of the singular one to a 'live', non-switched wire...
How did he not check it??

 

[Averagesupernova]

TL;DR Summary: Recessed Lights on ONE Switch
Switch is basic ON/OFF, no dimmer nothing fancy.:
SWITCH goes ON: One light OFF rest of lights ON
SWITCH goes OFF: Light that was OFF now ON rest of lights on but dim.

OK This is BOGGLING my mind. How is it even possible? I am trying to figure it out before I look in the Jboxes of the lights.
Any ideas?

Yes. My idea is to make the guy who installed them fix it. It's not that difficult to know what happened here on the other end of the internet. If it boggles your mind it is an indication you are in over your head.

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

Apparently, he still managed to mess up the wiring.
He messed up, he should do the cleanup/redo.
Don't touch it.

There should be three in parallel, in series with the singular one, which is shorted by the switch => quite dangerous setup.
I think he managed to connect one of the wires of the singular one to a 'live', non-switched wire...
How did he not check it??

Yup you got it right. I wanted to challenge myself to figure it out before I opened the can to look inside. I am learning AC Wiring from scratch so I wanted to think it though first.

How did he not figure it out?
The power was completely off to my house so he had no way to turn the switch on. And the way that the wires came into the box it was easy to confuse them when standing on a ladder. I rewired it the exact same wrong way on my first try.

About having him back:
That is a complicated situation. I have a interesting relationship with my electrician... He is an electrical engineer and a fragile genius. There is no way that I can explain the situation online to strangers.... except to say think of the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld.
Also, I wanted to challenge myself to understand it as part of my personal learning and not to miss the opportunity to figure it out for myself by just getting someone else to do it for me.
The best learning for me is troubleshooting.

As for it being dangerous to work on wiring:
As one of my employers (who was also one of my professors in University) told me: if you respect and employ all the appropriate safety precautions, protocols and PPE, you should not be overly worried. I have designed PPE/Industrial Hygeine Protocols as part of my job, also been a safety inspector in other jobs. Nevertheless, thank you much for the concern, it is always a good reminder because anyone can slip up, have a negligent moment etc.

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

TO ANYONE WHO IS ANNOYED by my POSTS and QUESTIONS
THIS MESSAGE is for YOU:

First, I really appreciate all of you who have taken time to help me on my learning journey. AC Wiring has become a passion of mine. My educational background in industrial chemical engineering so circuits aren't intuitive to me the way that they are to you guys.

The way that any sort of substance flows through an industrial process is very similar to the way that electrons flow through a circuit except when it's not. What I mean by that is that there are some key fundamental differences that tend to be very intellectually jarring to us chemmies when we come across them. As a result, we have to stop and think things though from scratch in order to work around the knowledge and understanding that we have already developed and internalized in our own fields in order to build an intuitive understanding for circuits. Until we get to that point we are tripping over the intuitive understandings we've developed from our education and experience working in our own field and trying to make sense of electrical circuitry concepts in light of chemical process concepts. It's a non sequitur. It doesn't work.

Learning AC electrical principles is for that reason an extremely challenging endeavor to undertake and that is also what makes it so fascinating to me and that is why it has captured my passionate attention so very much.

As for the people who I have frustrated with my posts: I am sorry, take a break, ignore me for a while and know that I am coming at this from a paradigm that is rigged to confound... but that is what makes it so exciting and so worth it. That's what makes it so obsessively interesting to learn.

I will give you guys an example of how we chemmies think about circuits: We had a very demanding and 'strong-willed' professor in our circuit design classes and in Circuit Design 1 lol... our whole class felt so hopeless, trying to wrap our minds around this stuff for the first time, that everyone lol lied to the prof the day before the exam and said that nobody had ever studied imaginary numbers before so he could not put it on the exam as a result. He was so steamed that his response to all of us was "well actually my leg has been hurting me now for 3 days." rofl OMG

One of the funniest moments every from the sweet old university days.


SO if you are excited to teach me I am excited to learn.
If you are getting annoyed, put me on ignore and check on posts from other electrical engineers...
(..or go over to the Chemical Engineering forums and try to understand from first principles what they are talking about lol)
Easier just to click my name and then put me on your ignore list.
Love y'all!

 

[Tom.G]

Yeah, as in any large group, there are a few stick-in-the-mud personalities that show up on occassion. Some have reason for that approach and some don't.

On the other hand, there are a occassionally people that ask for help on a technical project that is clearly beyond them. To avoid (effectively) encouraging suicide, we take the "safe" approach and suggest they hire a "professional."

Oh well.

Cheers,
Tom

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

Yeah, as in any large group, there are a few stick-in-the-mud personalities that show up on occassion. Some have reason for that approach and some don't.

On the other hand, there are a occassionally people that ask for help on a technical project that is clearly beyond them. To avoid (effectively) encouraging suicide, we take the "safe" approach and suggest they hire a "professional."

Oh well.

Cheers,
Tom

I understand. I get super obsessed with certain subjects when I am learning them and I can't let someone else just do it until I've figured it out for myself. As for safety it is top priority for me as an engineer and also because of all of the industrial & lab safety design work that I have done in jobs... not to mention the engineering gone wrong videos that they showed us in 4th year that are still burned to the back of my brain.

Maybe there are meds for that or something!

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

As far as it goes in the world of electrical engineering: I am ignorant but not stupid.
If someone wants to teach me then I can become less ignorant.
Stupid is someone who doesn't want to get it so never will.

I understand that it can be annoying tho to discuss with someone who is just developing the big picture and connecting dots that others have had connected for years and years. It may make one sound stupid but if that were the case I wouldn't have learned so much from you all already.

 

[Rive]

if you respect and employ all the appropriate safety precautions, protocols and PPE

It is not 'just' about personal safety.

It is also about those, who will use that lighting in the future: about the next technician (or even: firefighter, inspector or other officials) who will touch those wires at some point in the future and expect them being done in the regular way: and finally, about all those who will take your story and attitude as an example to follow on the internet.

 

[Averagesupernova]

https://www.physicsforums.com/threa...e-current-leakage-from-furnace.1061489/page-2
-
I assume I am who you are referring to about being frustrated by your posts. The above link right around post #60 illustrates why I think you are in over your head. You didn't grasp that the connection made between two wires at the molex connector is no different than a connection made between several wires 10 inches away from the molex connector on the same wire is the same thing. Unless I misunderstood, it is obvious to me you are missing out on some very very basic stuff. Now that in and of itself isn't so bad. But before you go poking around with 110 VAC stuff you need to get your head wrapped around circuit nodes, Kirchoff laws, stuff like this. Basic circuit analysis.

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

https://www.physicsforums.com/threa...e-current-leakage-from-furnace.1061489/page-2
-
I assume I am who you are referring to about being frustrated by your posts. The above link right around post #60 illustrates why I think you are in over your head. You didn't grasp that the connection made between two wires at the molex connector is no different than a connection made between several wires 10 inches away from the molex connector on the same wire is the same thing. Unless I misunderstood, it is obvious to me you are missing out on some very very basic stuff. Now that in and of itself isn't so bad. But before you go poking around with 110 VAC stuff you need to get your head wrapped around circuit nodes, Kirchoff laws, stuff like this. Basic circuit analysis.

I am not referring to any one specific person. Sorry if it seemed personal it is not.

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

It is not 'just' about personal safety.

It is also about those, who will use that lighting in the future: the next technician (or even: firefighter, inspector or other officials) who will touch those wires at some point in the future and expect them being done in the regular way: and finally, all those who will take your story and attitude as an example to follow on the internet.

PPE refers to personal safety whereas safety protocols and precautions refer to protecting self as well as others.

This thread has gone too far into the weeds...
I am sorry that I posted it and bothered all of you.

 

[UrbanFarmEngineer]

This thread has strayed far from the point of the original post.
I am sorry that I have bothered all of you.

I wish you all the best in your learning and in your careers in your family lives and in all spheres.

I advise myself before anyone else: may we not become people who miss the context for the mere text and may we not become those who discourage others due to our own myopic views about the methodologies and mechanisms of the learning of others. Someone's learning more can never make another's knowledge less. Above every knower there is a knower and love is the vehicle that drives one forward be it in academic learning or in any facet of life.

May we all find what it is that we seek and may it bring tranquility into hearts.

Goodbye All
Much Love.

 

[Rive]

I am sorry that I posted it

The issue is not the posting of the thread: the question itself is completely fine.
The issue is the subsequent advocating of DIY tweaking on house wiring for line voltage and then that lame rhetori-psycho stuff at the end.

have a interesting relationship with my electrician... He is an electrical engineer and a fragile genius.

I'm also kind of an EE and is very, very allergic to cases when somebody else is cleaning my mess.
Especially when it's behind my back.

And it becomes absolutely infuriating when it's by somebody far less competent than me.

We EEs are a proud bunch.

The power was completely off to my house so he had no way to turn the switch on.

That's no excuse. Most wirings done without power and most testings comes when there is power already.

 

[sophiecentaur]

That's no excuse. Most wirings done without power and most testings comes when there is power already.

Vast installations are often done without power. That's why it's important to use the correct cables (current rating and colours) and follow the recommended components and layout. Circuits can be tested without connection but the right gear is needed - too expensive for your average DIYer or 'helper'.

If the installer gets it wrong and there's a subsequent accident / problem then it's down to his insurer to pay. If he (unlikely to be a she; they have too much sense) is not qualified then he won't be covered by insurance and you may end up paying for the consequences from your own money. If you look at the wiring behind each of the units and see any differences in the way they're connected (colours and connections) then challenge your installer.

If you have any difficulty dealing with him then you have a problem. Don't rely on 'friends' for this sort of stuff; they may be clever and mean well but, without trade experience, they can often go wrong.

In a similar way, DIY was once popular with car enthusiasts and that often led to expensive re-solving of problems. These days, diy is much harder and there are far fewer problems when the garage has done the job with the right analysis equipment. (But it costs you, of course.)

 

[berkeman]

Thread is closed for Moderation...

 

[berkeman]

Goodbye All

Um, your new sockpuppet account has been banned, BTW.

Thread will remain closed.