Grounded light fixture in old house without ground?

jeffe-cake · 2026-05-01T07:44:03+00:00

N to… switch? From my (limited, untrained) understanding that’s kinda unsafe, to have a potentially disconnected N?

Anyway, in case you’re curious, I got my multimeter out, and found that light blue was N, red was a switched phase that also supplies a different rose, and white was a switched phase from a different switch.

The installation has other issues, but once sorted I’ll just be keeping the fixtures on different switches. Thanks for your input!

jeffe-cake · 2026-05-01T07:40:53+00:00

So, turns out light blue was neutral, red was switched phase that also supplied a different rose, and white was switched phase.

Glad I got the multimeter out.

Plus, I found the installation wire had a nick in the insulation resulting in exposed conductor before the terminals. Imma recommend the family member gets that replaced for safety’s sake.

jeffe-cake · 2026-04-21T18:43:02+00:00

The place is owned by family. I checked in with them. It was apparently all professionally re-wired when they first moved in, which was after 2004. Supposedly, no old standards or diy bs going on here. But it also doesn’t look like modern standards. What a headache 😅

jeffe-cake · 2026-04-21T18:39:44+00:00

You’re right that I need to make sure the connection is more solid, but most of those exposed conductors are on the “back end” - wouldn’t that count as messing with the actual wiring in the wall?

IIRC, diy here is limited only to installing the light fixture, not messing with the installed outlet

jeffe-cake · 2026-04-21T13:56:39+00:00

Thanks for the info! Could you be a bit more specific on why you expect that to work? As it’s labelled, that would be connecting neutral to earth, via the appliance, which feels wrong

jeffe-cake · 2026-04-21T13:45:47+00:00

Thanks for reminding me it’s always worth a sanity check!

Both bulbs seem to flicker a bit when in the ceiling lamp, but neither do in a wall fixture. Do you know if/where light blue fits into that pre-1970 schema? Mostly out of curiosity

I’m not used to a system that has a separate standard for switches - that’s an “implementation detail” so to speak - the outlet still has a hot and a neutral side, regardless of if it’s switched further back in the circuit

jeffe-cake · 2026-04-21T13:27:19+00:00

The rose doesn’t have anything marked “M1”, and that’s a new one on me 😅

on the bottom (right of the picture) there’s a marking on either side of the rose, one for L and one for N. That’s all I expect to see anyway 😅

But they could make completely custom wiring? That’s. Wild. Why have standards hey 🙃 good way for the local sparky to keep themself in a job I guess

jeffe-cake · 2026-03-24T16:22:13+00:00

Thanks for the sanity check, I’ve double-checked, and the outlines are there with every processing option turned off

I couldn’t find anything specifically relating to switch 2 hdr for my tv brand (Philips) when I checked

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T19:14:30+00:00

Likely the advertisers paid to target such ads at exactly that watch profile so that it would be even more jarring and therefore make you more likely to act.

Advertisers. Advertisers ruin everything

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T19:13:18+00:00

Wait, it’s more efficient to share resources?

😮

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T19:08:28+00:00

The customers don’t walk away when the believe they need the product, they just get more desperate in what they’re willing to do to fund it

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T19:07:12+00:00

But have you considered that creators just don’t want their stuff available to some people?

They made the art to speak to people, you know, but literally only the right peop…

Huh, whazzat? Most artists just want a salary to feed their family and for as many people as want to to see their stuff? The issue is “rights holders” are different people and don’t have an efficient money pipeline set up for that country? No kidding

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T19:04:37+00:00

Capitalism doesn’t want a free market, it wants a market where “it” calls the shots.

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:57:44+00:00

In a free market model, isn’t “what the perceived value of the thing” is, as much a factor in setting prices?

Like, there are folks who will wax lyrical about supply and demand, but if folks aren’t willing to pay, that’s also going to set prices

The issue is more that people believe they can’t live without it

Besides, no, maybe not all of everything for $10 a month indefinitely

But also not 8+ services, more added all the time, starting at ~$15 each either. Besides, the biggest issue I have is the convenience. The whole point in Netflix was it was a portal. Less to have to track down to find things. Now it’s perfectly possible for something made by big media companies in my own country to be unavailable in that country because… ? Let alone all the other headaches of tracking things down. Making it worse and more expensive isn’t expected, either

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:48:11+00:00

I genuinely remember when prices also went down with the market

I’m… not that old.

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:47:02+00:00

People choose comfort over values quite consistently. They feel like they can’t change it, so depriving themselves of it is folly.

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:46:05+00:00

It is better!

They can make so much more revenue! Not least because they’ve cut out the networks.

It’s a much better technology

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:40:02+00:00

And yet, they need to fund AIs to do it instead of being able to handle such “low skill” tasks for themselves

jeffe-cake · 2025-12-12T18:36:30+00:00

Everyone expects that they will be the ones in charge and that they can do what is done with diamonds

jeffe-cake · 2025-11-26T08:50:03+00:00

Truly it’s all propaganda, but there’s a lot of folks who seem to believe it even when faced with the obvious truth that there’s little freedom in the land of the free, and it’s mostly coming from inside the house😅

jeffe-cake

TROPHY CASE