It is just a little bit scary because it’s a light switch and you automatically assume it is electricity from the light switch itself which it is truly not. That is when you touch the light switch or anything else that you will see a small spark and a quick little zap. If you have sock feet or carpet and you were walking across the carpet you will build up enough charge. Especially if you have an electric heat source that dries your home out quite well. This most likely happens in the winter time. You are most likely have static electricity if humidity is low in the year and the conditions are warm and dry. One of the first things it could be as static electricity. It scares you more than anything but you’re not sure what to do about it. OK so your touch your light switch to turn it on and you get a small jolt. So Why Do I Get A Shock From My Light Switch? Two you have a grounded neutral in your electrical system and that is more serious. One it’s a static shock from sock feet on carpet and you have nothing to worry about. You are getting a shock from your light switch for two possible reasons.
Check out these electrical "how-to" books that I used to teach myself how to install a light switch and much, much more. When you're ready for the next level it's time to get your learnin' on. It's a great project to start learning how to do electrical projects around your house. Here's a picture of all the tools I ended up using. To avoid frustration prep all of the materials you'll need a day before you attempt the project. If I had had everything I needed I probably could have changed that out in about an hour. I had to go back and carefully recheck my work. The lights in the work room were not coming on even though my new switch worked fine. You wire something incorrectly - For example, in the project above I thought I twisted three black wires together but in fact one was not tied in correctly. Prepare ahead of time to put in a new one.Ĥ. Just take a note of the box size before you start. Granted, this one takes a bit more work to fix but it is still fairly easy. I ran into this problem just doing this project. So you try to use a utility knife and some pliers but you end up damaging the wire or worse, cutting yourself bleeding all over your new switch. Label all of them today! One time and you're done.Ģ. Your breaker panel isn't labeled - You end up spending an hour just figuring out how to start. The only draw back was that I had un-wire everything in order to install it.Ĥ Gotchas that make installing a light switch difficultġ. He recommended this new box that they're stocking which has an awesome little extra space that I call a "side-car" I went to Home Depot and talked to Wayne. Not to mention the fact that there were now three more wire nuts than before because the new switch didn't use terminal screws. So what happened here was the original electrical box was way to small for the new and much larger switch. The process is more or less the same for a dimmer or three-way switch with some minor twists and turns.
In this case I'm installing the motion sensing switch with a timer and a on/off button that you see above. How do you install a light switchīefore you can install a light switch you need to have a light switch. But first, let's start with the basic light switch installation steps. At the end of the post I have a list of 4 gotchas that make this easy project. Heck, even the back of the box shows it in 3 easy steps.Įxcept, it's not so easy if you haven't done it before. On the surface installing a light switch seems easy. Install a new motion sensing light switch. Regardless, each night I have to trudge down to the basement storage room, which is about 8 leagues under the sea, and check. Sometimes they remember, other times, not so much. I remind Charlotte and Christian about 2000 times per year to turn off the lights in the basement after feeding the cats. How do you install a light switch? It seems simple enough.
Be sure to read Step 4 to see why this light switch installation was only just beginning. Seconds after this photo, I realized I had a big problem.