Be Excellent To Each Other

I appreciate I could just google this, but it's hopefully funnier to shower you all with my incompetence.

At some point, we had a loft light fitted, and the switch has a handy light on it, so you can see it in the dark.
At some later point, possibly related to me changing a light fitting that is almost certainly the previous one in the circuit, but possibly completely coincidental, that light (as in the one on the switch, not the actual light itself), stopped working. However, it does still work when the light is on, so I'm struggling to get my head around exactly what might have gone wrong and where.

I'm open to suggestions that hopefully won't lead to me getting an electric shock (again).

Nobody tell him.

Fucking nobody tell him.

Actually I have no idea how to Google this.

I refer the honorable gentleman to my previous answer.

Well the next step is just taking things apart to see what doesn't look right, although I'm sure I can find a million things to do before I have to take another light fitting down.

How do you get the light on if the switch doesn't work when the light is turned off? Are there two switches?

If not, the solution is simple.

Reavers.

One switch, which works just as you would expect, other than the light on the switch not being on when the actual light is off (which doesn't make sense to me either, hence the question).

From what I could find last night, this doesn't require any special wiring over and above a normal switch (but having the switch light on when the actual light is on does, so reavers might be a good answer).

Er, just leave it alone and use a small torch to locate the switch in the dark?

House electrics are witch craft, your fancy switch has run out of magic, buy a new one. And wire it up when you've switched the power off at the consumer unit!

Glow in the dark paint! You need to lower your tech

I am not sure if this will help you, but worth a look, perhaps:

http://www.doityourself.com/forum/elect ... tch.html#b

I have a light in my loft but it's on a pull string which you can reach when the hatch is open.

Just saying like.

That just seems to suggest that it should still work, although I think I understand it a bit better. Still no idea how it exists in it's current (pun not intended) state though.

Do a loft conversion. Put windows in. Makes the switch easier to find.

lighting circuits can get needlessly complicated, particularly as any of the cables can be the "live" depending on how you wire them.

We're moving, the loft conversion won't add value above the ceiling price (probably).

The switch is easy enough to find, I'm just trying to get my head round why it worked, and now it doesn't, and what I should be looking for.

The people buying it won't know that it was ever there

You might be right (GJ's response to this thread was, "why do you care?"), but I have a niggling concern that it's a symptom of something else not quite being right. On the other hand, I might be completely making it up and it never did this in the first place, or the switch has just run out of magic.

You're selling the ceiling separately? Is it a convertible?

Well you can see a bit of light through the roof, so technically, maybe.

Is it on when the previous one in the circuit is on?

I meant to check that, but haven't. I'm going to assume I've been in the loft when that light was on, and would have noticed that the light on the switch was on, but it's possible I haven't/didn't.

Catweazle didn't call it electrickery without good cause.

Most extreme solution everz.

I remember doing something similar with the shower switch, it is todo with the live wires.

How many wires were there int he fitting you changed?

Being an electrical circuit, I don't think it works that way. The switch just acts as an isolator, so when it's off, the shower has no power. It's almost wired up opposite to a lighting circuit as the switch is on the loop and the shower spurs off that.

In the light fitting? It was ages ago, but I would assume 3 live, 2 neutral and a switched live (and the earth).

I would say it is a total coincidence. The light on the switch would be connected inside the switch, so almost certainly the lamp or bulb in the switch has failed. The switch itself is clearly getting power, so the light should work.

You really need to work on your catchphrases.

But the LED does work when the main light is on.

Witch craft. Buy a new one before goat sacrifice becomes necessary.

Needs more LEDs

it does, my electriction mate told me when he came and fixed it.