I removed a bathroom light fixture, and now the outlets don't work. What happened?
Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 at
10:29 am
We are remodeling the bathroom and removed the light fixture over the vanity. Now the outlets on either side of the vanity don’t work, and no power is getting to the wires sticking out of the wall where the light fixture used to be. None of the breakers tripped, but I flipped them all off and back on again just to be sure.
So what could have happened? Did something come loose behind the wall?
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Tagged with: breakers • light fixture • vanity
Filed under: Bathroom Remodeling Tips
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You probably broke the neutral wire connection, where the it was the first or homerun from from the panel. And each other outlet etc… in the bathroom lost its neutral wire. Without it there is no return path for the hot wire back to the lectrical panel to complete the circuit.
Lost neutrals are the hardest to check for without a volt meter. Voltage ticks or proximaty testers will beep if the wire is the hot wire, even if there is no neutral wire. The hat wire hooked to the electrical panel has the same voltage potential any whre along the wire, that is why the tick tester can read the voltage.