Purpose of neutral wire?

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ahh, makes sense. I wasn't sure what the humidity sensor was all about. have you checked to see if there is anything in the area of the installation that would be giving the switch trouble? Maybe it gets too hot where it is or something like that.
 
So is there fancy internals in the switch that choose where to run the current? Out on the ground line vs the neutral line?
>AFAIK no switch or appliance runs more than microamps into the ground line. It's probably a violation of some U.L. rule.

Any reason other appliances don't require such a fancy switch?
>It depends on how much they are asking the switch to do.
Running extra wires is so costly and electronics nowadays is so cheap that they can squeeze quite a bit of performance from one, two or three wires. Or they just go wireless.
 
Normal switches do not run any power out a ground wire. A ground is NOT a current carrying conductor.
 
Actually, increasing current in the ground wire could indicate that the appliance insulation is breaking down and over 5 mA should trip any GFCIs in the line.
For a few dollars in parts you could make a tester that will not blow out the internal fuse on your multimeter's current measuring ranges.
 
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