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Home Repair Electrical Wiring Lighting

Light switch suddenly won't work

3 years ago

Hello,

In an old bathroom of mine, the ceiling light suddenly stopped working. I replaced the bulbs and then the light fixture with a new one that was a spare I had sitting around. That did not fix it. I had already checked with my multi meter that it was receiving power. The voltage detector shows it is receiving power. It properly lights up when next to the hot wires. Putting it next to the red traveler wire, it turns off. If I turn the switch on, the red traveler wire indicates voltage with the detector. Also the neutral wire on the ceiling fixture will show voltage if the switch is on. It's off if the switch is off.

Literally nothing changed in the environment in months. A couple days ago, the light stopped working. The switch next to it runs the ceiling vent/fan just fine. The plugs in the room are just fine and show wired properly with a receptacle tester.

I can't seem to figure out how it stopped working and why everything seems normal.

Here is a picture of the wiring of the switch on the wall. (The box for the light fixture in the ceiling has just 1 pair of hot and neutral) I did notice one of the traveler wires is looped around a screw. That has always been there. I did replace this switch after this picture, wiring it exactly the same, just to make sure.

Anyone have any thoughts on why this might be? Thanks!

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Comments (4)

Ron Natalie
3 years ago
It's a short cut by the electrician (probably the builder). The only other way would likely be to have an extra wire in the box pig tailed to this wire (cut in to two).

There's nothing in the code that prohibits this practice. Some inspectors might have an issue, but there's really nothing wrong with it. This isn't your problem.

I don't think that's a traveller wire. You'd not hook a traveller up this way (it only connects from one switch to another. This is almost certainly a hot wire that feeds this switch and then proceeds on to some other device.
Mark
Original Author
3 years ago
I wasn't sure that was even the problem, just wanted to point out that wasn't 2 wires connected to the screw. There are a couple travelers connected via the push-in connectors, though.
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weedmeister
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Mark
Original Author
3 years ago
So, to close loop on this. It turns out, to my embarrassment, there is a light switch under a towel rack that I never knew about (This is the kid's bathroom.) That's why I thought it was strange to have a 3 way switch in that room. That switch was off. The light only turns on if both are flipped up. That's not great, but I'll take it. Finding all sorts of fun things in this house since we moved in.

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