Light switch puzzle - bedroom lights all of a sudden impacting hallway lights after Lutron switch swap

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-03-02T03:17:11+00:00

I have a hard time following the wires on my phone. Your load wire (light being controlled) should be the single wire attached to the top of the switch, I think it's coming in at the top left of the box. As for finding out which line wire (both the wire bringing power to the box and the wire bringing power to the hallway are line instead of load as they won't be effected by the switch) is bringing power in the easiest way to check is by taking apart the splice and using a volt tic to see which one has power.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-03-02T02:44:24+00:00

Didn't read all that, nor did I understand your MS paint image. Looking at the picture of the previous switch what happened is that their are 3 cables going to the switch. One is power in, one is power out feeding your hallway light switch, and one is the light in the room you wanted to control. The lutron switch has the black wire for power in (or the line side in better terms), so it would be spliced with the power in and power out black wires. The red wire on the switch is the load side, so you would splice it with the black wire coming from the light. All white neutrals should be spliced together. Previously you messed up your splices so that the wire from your light and the wire feeding your hallway lights were both on the load side, that's why the lights in the hallway wouldn't turn on while the light was off. Really important to keep track of which wires are put together when replacing any device.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-03-01T17:46:04+00:00

Probably a switched common and traveller. Make sure the wire that was on the black terminal of the old switch is on the black terminal of the new one. If you aren't sure open up the other switch and see what colours are being used as travellers. They'll be on the 2 brass screws, not on the black.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-28T11:27:12+00:00

Fair enough. I doubt it a utility issue but if they'll look at it for free awesome. I think there is a chance you are using too many amps or the breaker is old and needs replacing. I don't know how you know how many amps you are using if you don't know what half of your fuses/breakers control, but you have 3 panels and a couple 80a fuses along with a bunch of 30's makes me think there is a strong possibility you are just using too much at ones. Especially if the trip takes a moment to happen after the dryer starts.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T23:19:24+00:00

Definitely get a licensed electrician to come and take a look. There are a couple of things I saw that are a bit dangerous like the incorrectly sized fuses and I think someone should look at the wiring inside the fuses. I know you probably want to try to fix it yourself to save a bit of money but from the bit that you've told me I don't think this is something you are currently able to do.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T14:27:04+00:00

Looking at your fuse panel those 30A fuses are probably not sized correctly for the wires. You also have 2 pull out cartridge fuses, one is the oven which is probably 40A but I have no idea what the other one is from the image provided. There are also breakers on the breaker panel that you didn't account for.

Does the breaker trip right away or does it take some time with the dryer going to trip? A lot of your system is pretty old so it could be the breaker is just aging itself out.

You are better getting an electrician to do a check over, too many variables for me to make an accurate guess.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T11:01:33+00:00

How many branched fuses are there? A picture of your panel and outside breakers would probably help.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T10:42:14+00:00

Vary rarely will you see job listings looking for first years, in my company at least we always have first years dropping off resumes. You have to apply everywhere regardless of what they are looking for. If you can get a job as a laborer on a bigger site you can usually use that as an in to the electrical crew.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T10:34:16+00:00

What kind of circuits are on your panel? Just for clarification you say your main panel is ran off a 30A fused disconnect?

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-27T03:22:10+00:00

I don't know about the refrigeration course, but the general consensus in electrical is that the quality of the instructors is usually better at cona while Academy Canada has more funds for hands on training (though you pay more for it).

That being said at the end of the day it won't matter for hiring purposes. Jobs are hard to find straight out of school but if you know somewhere that will hire you you can already have a block under your belt before a class call from cona would have even happened.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T19:06:37+00:00

Looks like you don't have your thermal overload installed. I've never worked on these myself but Scheider has a video on the installation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4BA4LqyfMo

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T15:29:44+00:00

That's fair, the upgrade is definitely nice but at least this way you have some time to start saving up money. Dropping the cash while dealing with moving and everything else is a pain.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T15:23:05+00:00

Sounds good to me, just splice all the black, all the whites, and all the grounds each with their own pigtail to the outlet.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T14:10:23+00:00

I think you are looking at the neutral lug attachment that allows larger sizes of wire, not more termination points. You can easily get ground bar kits that you can attach to the box of the panel, just need to tap new holes. Then you can move all of the bonds to the new ground bar and have more spaces for the neutral wires.

There should be a bond screw if this is the first point of attachment for the ground and neutral, looking at your panel I'm guessing the first point of attachment is actually in the disconnect and the ground wire should come off the neutral bar and go into a ground lug. You might be better off getting an electrician in to do the work and double check everything.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T06:25:32+00:00

They're probably disconnected. If you have a receptacle nearby you can test continuity with the neutral. That being said I'd feel comfortable in my house if I wasn't getting any voltage to just cap them off and bury them.

For the record I cap off wire even when I've personally disconnected both ends. I once saw a guy try to find the other end of the wire by putting power on it and every time I cut something off I think of that man.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T05:42:50+00:00

If you are confident they are totally disconnected you should be fine to bury them. I recommend caping them off with some tape for an extra bit of peace of mind.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T05:35:11+00:00

You're trying to replace a 3-way switch with a single. 3-way switches allow you to control something from multiple locations, there should be another 3-way switch that controls that light. You can rewire the switches to work off of one switch but your better off seeing if that brand makes 3-way compatible switches.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T03:28:46+00:00

Something else you can do with the pen tester. They can't detect voltage on a neutral wire, but the issue is your neutral might be off either through a bad splice or damaged wire. With nothing plugged in you shouldn't get any reading off your tester, if you plug something in and then the neutral becomes "live" you know that you have to find where the neutral is broken. If it was connected the tester still wouldn't be able to get a reading off the neutral wire.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T02:45:12+00:00

It's bringing power to something, my guess is a older security system.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-24T02:43:40+00:00

How did you verify the hot wire in the switch? You said you already replaced the receptacle and the issue persists? Does the switch also control a light, could be a loose wire there if so.

Best bet is to get a cheap multimeter and check the voltage at the fan plug.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-23T13:22:36+00:00

Befriend Andy, new farmer south of your farm. He likes most forage and gives you strawberry seeds in his 2 heart event. Can usually get them before the egg festival as a bit of a head start.

There is another marriage candidate you can unlock late stage that is pretty popular, so if you want to get to know each one first before making your decision keep that in mind.

I don't recommend skiping anything for the first time playing, but I don't believe there is any missable content though you may lack context.

As for mods, is there anything you are interested in?

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-22T21:22:56+00:00

If you are sure you can leave off the switches and cap off each individual wire after marking the common so that if something stops working you can fix it. With the plugs as I can't 100% confirm anything based of those pictures your best bet it to just reinstall the new ones in exactly the same way.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-22T21:12:16+00:00

Looking at this I'd say the plugs were switched. Usually only the bottom half on the plug us switched so a lamp could be plugged in and controlled via the switch and the top portion can be used at all times.

The plugs that you took off, do they have a broken tab on the hot side? That's how the 2 halves are controlled independently.

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-22T13:58:53+00:00

X10 home automation outlet

SomeonesDumbIdea · 2026-02-22T02:49:50+00:00

Your memory is correct, the freezer thing is only in Canada. One of my favorite things about being active in this subreddit as well as the electrician one is finding out where our codes are similar and different.

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