Fuse keeps blowing

[scottpetrie]

Hi
Yesterday I got a shock from my bathroom light switch. I took the switch off & noticed there were a couple of broken earth wires. Luckily there was enough length in the cable to be able to cut it and re-connect them. All was fine, but then I switched on my dining room light and it blew the fuse. Its an old fuse box so I re-wired the fuse and checked again. I checked every light in the house one by one but the dining room light blew it again. Could this be a coincidence & there is a problem with the dining room light or could it be linked to what I did to the bathroom light? Could it be the dining room bulb just needs replacing?
Thanks

 

[JohnD]

You have probably wired something wrong. Please post photos of everything you touched.

And buy a plastic switch for the bathroom. You can't afford to be getting shocks in there.

It is also possible that somebody deliberately disconnected the earth wires to conceal a pre-existing fault. Even more important to fit a plastic light switch.

 

[scottpetrie]

Hi. Nothing was actually changed in the light switch I worked on, I only re-connected the earth wires

 

[JohnD]

See my revised post.

Photos please.

And of the "fuse"

The earth wires are intended to make the fuse blow in certain fault conditions, for safety.

 

[scottpetrie]

Hi
This is the pic of the switch prior to re-connecting the earth (I did put a green/yellow sleeve back on). That earth was fine but there was another 2 I noticed had snapped. I managed to get enough wire out to rejoin it. It looked as if the earth had snapped due to it being bent so much. There is 3 seperate cables running to that switch. The switch and the back box is metal, only thing I did was put the earths to the switch earth and not the back box earth.

 

[EFLImpudence]

Hi. Nothing was actually changed in the light switch I worked on, I only re-connected the earth wires

Don't you consider that 'a change'?

How long had they been disconnected/broken?

 

[scottpetrie]

Don't you consider that 'a change'?

How long had they been disconnected/broken?

I dont know how long they had been broken but as soon as I removed the switched I noticed it

 

[JohnD]

The switch is about 50 years newer than the wiring and is a recent change

 

[chivers67]

The next thing to do it take off the Dinning room light switch and upload a photo to see if there's anything obvious on that part of the lighting circuit.

You may have to disconnect the Earths you re-terminated to determine whether with them removed the light works and fuse doesn't pop. Have you a Multimeter first of any description?

 

[scottpetrie]

Hi
Okay I will do this tomorrow in day light. Why would reconnecting the earths on one switch cause a different switch to blow the fuse?

 

[chivers67]

Depends what's terminated & how in the Dining room switch, somethings shorting out.

 

[scottpetrie]

So maybe the dining room switch was always the problem but the bathroom one was somehow “disguising” it. Now Ive fixed one, its now telling me that the other is at fault?

 

[JohnD]

So maybe the dining room switch was always the problem but the bathroom one was somehow “disguising” it. Now Ive fixed one, its now telling me that the other is at fault?

It need not be the switch. Wiring errors are more common in ceiling roses.

 

[scottpetrie]

Okay Ill need to take a look in day light tomorrow. Just seems strange I reconnect broken earths on one switch then a different one is causing the fuse to blow. Only reason I know they were at one time connect is because the 3 of them were wound together but 2 of them had snapped

 

[CBW]

Hi
This is the pic of the switch prior to re-connecting the earth (I did put a green/yellow sleeve back on). That earth was fine but there was another 2 I noticed had snapped. I managed to get enough wire out to rejoin it. It looked as if the earth had snapped due to it being bent so much. There is 3 seperate cables running to that switch. The switch and the back box is metal, only thing I did was put the earths to the switch earth and not the back box earth.

What is the black wire connected to?