berniesmith said:
The correct breaker was switched off, and I also switched off every breaker for the whole house. As for the last post---don't even bother posting if you don't know the answer. Thanks in advance to anyone who has any intelligent advice.
FFS.
You describe a switch which is so broken and clanky that you have to resort to ridiculous measures and bodges to get it to do its job, and then you ask if you should replace it? What kind of an answer do you expect to get? One which says "no, don't replace it, it's supposed to work like that"?
As for the breaker, if
you say that you have a current using appliance, but when you turn off the breaker the supply is not interrupted, there are two possibilities.
1) You've got the wrong breaker because they are incorrectly labelled, or because the appliance is supplied from a circuit you would not expect (both of which are quite common).
2) You know so little about your appliance that you don't even realise it does not have an electrical supply.
I went for the option which did not assume you were an idiot, but what would
you have preferred me to do?