Odd Wiring

[transienteagle]

All,

Have recently moved to a new house.

My view of the electrician that installed the main wiring in the house is that he was a totally "top notch banana" master craftsman. All wiring has been terminated beautifully, perfect earth crimps in each socket etc etc. The system is easily understandable.

My problem;

There is a small light above the patio doors that I wish to remove. The bulb in the light was broken when we moved into the house.

My normal procedure here is to 100% isolate the circuit (ie find both ends of the wire) before either removing the cable (if I can) or burying it in the wall in a suitable container.

The wiring is normal for lighting circuits.

I cannot make the circuit go live, I have looked in all light sockets in immediate vicinity and cannot find a feed.

Continuity tests on the exposed wires are positive live to neutral, positive live to earth, positive neutral to earth which looks to me as if all the wires are joined together (somewhere) and that this is a dead circuit except that i also get continuity against earth and neutral in an adjoining light switch which seems to me that this circuit is still active on a light circuit.

I cannot trace the wire (fully tiled bathroom above) and cannot just bury it away since I cannot isolate fully.

From my first comment you can tell that I have great faith in the electrician that installed the system and do not believe that he would leave a dead circuit lying around.

Are there any additional tests that I could (should) carry out to fully convince myself that this is indeed a dead circuit or ideas on how to trace the wiring.


regards

TE

 

[TexMex]

You don't mention how you are testing continuity. If you are using a multimeter on the wrong scale, you will get a positive result between live and neutral if there are any other appliances on the circuit switched on. (NB This circuit may not be the lighting circuit). If you test continuity between Neutral and Earth you should expect a positive result.

You mention that there is a positive result for your continuity test between neutral and earth at the light switch. Usually, you shouldn't expect to find a neutral at the light switch, only a Live, and a switched return.

If you have, indeed, found a Neutral at the light switch, this should be connected into a chock block connector with no connection to the switch. If this is what you have found, as I say, a continuity test to earth should be expected to prove positive.

It would be more helpfull, if you could describe exactly what wires you see at the switch and at the light fitting. From the brief description you have given, it sounds like there may be a junction box in the circuit somewhere that you will have to find. This may be in the void under the floorboards, somewhere quite local to the light fitting.