Manesero
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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I've been wanting to install some floodlights in my backyard for some time. Recently I bought some floodlights that I thought would do the job. I purchased 2 sets of lights, each set comes with 2 lights. Each light is a 100 W halogen bulb, for a total max output of 400W.
I wired the lights through my attic, and daisy chained one to the other, such that I have wires going into the first light, out of the first light and into the second light. The 14-2 wire I have terminates at the second set of lights.
I wired them into an existing circuit that currently serves a couple of outdoor wall outlets. These outlets are not being used at the moment.
After I wired them (white to white, black to black, ground to ground) and hooked them up to the switch, I turn the breaker back on. I then hit the switch to turn on the lights. The first time, they lit up the back yard nice for about 5 second, and then the breaker tripped. So I reset everything, and double check all my wiring and made sure these were the only items drawing power from the circuit. I then reset the breaker and turned them on again whereafter I here a buzz for about a half second, and then the breaker trips.
Here's my set-up in a brief summary.
15 AMP breaker
14-2 Romex
light switch wired in tandem with existing circuit
feeder line from the switch to the first set of lights
feeder line from the first set of lights to the second set of lights
Romex terminates at the second set of lights.
Any ideas? I already tried bread.
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Mangler_SC
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Well if you tried bread already, I'm out of ideas...
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. Mangler had an accident on the way home from the liquor store. He was run off the road and crashed into a woman's clinic. It was one giant Pabst smear. -Bou_Te . Soylent CLiKK -- It's PEEEEEOPLEEE 
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Jezza_Belle
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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I'd guess that you need to wire it to a 20 amp breaker.
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le_mot
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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You could have a bad fixture. Try hooking up each set of lights individually and see if a single set will pop the breaker.
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Aerlinthian
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Old dry rot breaker? (Note, I didn't run any math on your layout)
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Hyperimiator
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Jezza_Belle posted:
I'd guess that you need to wire it to a 20 amp breaker.
For a 20 amp breaker the entire circuit on that system needs to be 12 gauge not 14.
You must have a short in one of the fixtures, I am assuming you wired them in parallel vs series.
Disconnect one light at a time to diagnose which fixture is causing the short.
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The Hyperimiator song http://www.wfmu.org/listen.ram?show=1639&starttime=1:40:35 "You are never going to be able to vote for the revolution. Get that hope out of your mind" -Jerry Rubin http://www.youtube.com/user/Hyperimiator#p/u
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Manesero
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Hyperimiator posted:
Jezza_Belle posted:
I'd guess that you need to wire it to a 20 amp breaker.
For a 20 amp breaker the entire circuit on that system needs to be 12 gauge not 14.
You must have a short in one of the fixtures, I am assuming you wired them in parallel vs series.
Disconnect one light at a time to diagnose which fixture is causing the short.
if everything is unplugged, then I would be running 400 W max, right? a 15 amp w/ 120 V and am 80% efficiency should amount to a max allowable of about 1440 W, right? so the amperage is not the issue.
Hyper, I've wire them like so, where the | represents a three strand wire.
Breaker
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Light Switch
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Fixture One
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Fixture Two
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Reapist
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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.
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Mangler_SC
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Wait, wait, wait! What kind of bread was it? French? Sourdough? Wheat?
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. Mangler had an accident on the way home from the liquor store. He was run off the road and crashed into a woman's clinic. It was one giant Pabst smear. -Bou_Te . Soylent CLiKK -- It's PEEEEEOPLEEE
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Manesero
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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It was Rye bread.
So I've checked for noticeable shorts in the light fixtures, and I don't see any.
But here's some interesting news... after undoing the fixtures, and then putting them back in, I'm able to turn the flood lights on... however, whenever I turn them off, the circuit blows.
I turn on all the lights on the circuit, and then I turn on the flood lights, and everything works great... at least 15 minutes great.
I then turn off the flood lights and the circuit blows.
I turn off all the lights on the circuit, and then I turn on the flood lights, and everything works great... another 15 minutes great.
I then turn off the flood lights and the circuit blows.
That's an interesting thing now, any ideas?
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Mangler_SC
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Manesero posted:
It was Rye bread.
Well, there's your problem right there! Should have tried a hushpuppy. Possibly cornbread...
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. Mangler had an accident on the way home from the liquor store. He was run off the road and crashed into a woman's clinic. It was one giant Pabst smear. -Bou_Te . Soylent CLiKK -- It's PEEEEEOPLEEE
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Tacit_MT
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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You are using a standard single pole light switch (2 terminals + 1 ground) and not a 3 way switch (3 terminals + ground), correct? And you're only connecting the black wires to the switch, one line side (to the breaker) the other the load side (to the lights)?
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Manesero
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Tacit_MT posted:
You are using a standard single pole light switch (2 terminals + 1 ground) and not a 3 way switch (3 terminals + ground), correct? And you're only connecting the black wires to the switch, one line side (to the breaker) the other the load side (to the lights)?
Single Pole light switch like this one here.
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202026988/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053&superSkuId=202887016
Black wire from the breaker line attaches to several other black wires from other outlets in the same box. So I hooked up a short black wire from the breaker line to the light switch.
White wire from the breaker line attaches to several other white wires from other outlets in the same box. I hooked up a short white wire from the breaker line to the light switch.
Ground wire from the breaker line attaches to several other ground wires from other outlets in the same box. I hooked up a short ground wire from the breaker line to the light switch.
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the_tessa
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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sounds like there is something borked with the switch
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Tacit_MT
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Manesero posted:
I hooked up a short white wire from the breaker line to the light switch.
There's your problem. How you got it to work at all is beyond me. Don't hook neutrals (white wires) to your switch. Your switch should 'switch' off the current on your hot (black) wires.
Your ground wire from your breaker (or receptacle, wherever you are tapping into power) should run to your lights and hook to the green terminal on your switch. White wires should run directly from your receptacle to your lights. Black wire from receptacle to one side of switch, black wire from lights to other side of switch.
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Hyperimiator
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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image=http://www.thecircuitdetective.com/tourcircuit.htm
http://knol.google.com/k/single-pole-switch-wiring-methods#
It is all explained above
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The Hyperimiator song http://www.wfmu.org/listen.ram?show=1639&starttime=1:40:35 "You are never going to be able to vote for the revolution. Get that hope out of your mind" -Jerry Rubin http://www.youtube.com/user/Hyperimiator#p/u
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Aerlinthian
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Hyperimiator posted:
http://knol.google.com/k/single-pole-switch-wiring-methods#
Nice site, apparently it is destined to be discontinued on May 1st. People may want to save info valuable to them.
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Manesero
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Problem fixed. Thanks guys
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Mangler_SC
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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You used pumpernickel rye instead of regular rye?
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. Mangler had an accident on the way home from the liquor store. He was run off the road and crashed into a woman's clinic. It was one giant Pabst smear. -Bou_Te . Soylent CLiKK -- It's PEEEEEOPLEEE
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Tipztoe
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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my only advice is to spend the money and get LED spotlights.
Not only do they use a fraction of what Halogen does for electricity, they more importantly are "invisible" to bugs.. so you won't have a swarm hovering around them like regular bulbs.
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_BlackAdder_
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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Manesero posted:
I wired the lights through my attic, and daisy chained one to the other, such that I have wires going into the first light, out of the first light and into the second light. The 14-2 wire I have terminates at the second set of lights.
Any ideas? I already tried bread.
I suggest branching the lights off a circuit that uses 12-2 wire and a 15-amp breaker. The small gauge wire cannot handle the amount of current required.
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-Foxy-
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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grats on getting it fixed 
alas, no pictures so big failure anyways
/le sigh 
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Dwaveran
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Subject:
electrician people - here's a question for you.
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i got here late, but glad it's working. I had a similar problem with my outside lights.
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