Help with Outside Garage Lighting

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My guess is , the white is hot & the switch leg is the black ( where they are feed from , I have no idea ) .

A non contact voltage tester should glow , on the hot . If neither is hot , you have to go investigate some where else in the house or garage .

( If you have a bare ground wire & it is connected properly , a contact volt meter will tell you if the white ot black is hot . )

God bless
Wyr
 
My guess is , the white is hot & the switch leg is the black ( where they are feed from , I have no idea ) .

A non contact voltage tester should glow , on the hot . If neither is hot , you have to go investigate some where else in the house or garage .

( If you have a bare ground wire & it is connected properly , a contact volt meter will tell you if the white ot black is hot . )

God bless
Wyr

The OP thinks when you saw the house first it was a timer switch but when he moved in it was a reg. switch that did not work as wired. White to cluster of whites black switched.

He found 2 cables to the garage, one to a sub box.

The second to an outlet. inside that does not work. And no power to the lights in question..

He has used a fluke sounder that I think does send sound to the lights.

I am thinking like you that it is a switch leg coming from the garage but then we have to find where the power or neutral is interrupted.

The confusion for who ever disconnected the timer was with the white as the time likely needed a neutral to work.. I think.
 
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Well , first thing I would do is to fine the hor or multiple hots at the switch box . And NOT mess up anything that is currently working .

Make sure the light or lights in question had good lamps installed .

Using a contact voltage tester , test from the known hot to each unknown wire . Identify with marking tape , those that show a voltage .

Determine if there is a neutral or bare earth ground in the switch box . If so , test between it ( as a reference ) to any of the unknown wires , that not show a voltage when tested in reference to the known hot .

Identify any new hots found . Keep in mind that if you are dealing with a 3 way switch , you do not have this 100%m nailed down .

Report back .

God bless
Wyr
 
img_20170626_183406-1618.jpg


Back again. This is what I did this time. I opened up junction box and seperated all the joining wires to try to isolate them and used my digital multimeter to measure for resistance on each wire to ground within the box. The only wire that came back with a good result was the white from the switch romex coming into the junction box, it had approx 0.8 ohm. The black from the switch was an open.

The romex going out of the junction box white and black were also both open. I also tried with the my DMM on the diode setting to listen for the beep sound, and tried my Fluke Networks Probe and used the box thingy to look for continuity on each wire. It all came back with same result just the white wire from switch returned with a good reading.

Also as you can see above in the pic that is the romex I presume is going to the garage conduit with the smaller box. However if you look at the pic closely the romex goes approx 5-6 feet towards the front of the house from my position of the pic and it seems to veer downward and to the left which is the right direction to the garage. However from there I have no idea where it goes, my guess is in the walls/ceiling somewhere. Even with the probe I can only hear a slight signal and not enough of an indication of where it goes.

Short of ripping out some drywall of even digging outside to see where this romex leaves the house I think I might now be stuck.

My question is if the white from the switch is good, how come the black is giving me an open? The length of the romex in this case is only about 5 feet.

Btw since I suspect this romex goes into the before mentioned garage receptacle because I doesn't work I decided to disconnect it and check each wire there. All wires here from conduit romex and wires to the outside lights all came back as open.

I am at a loss.
 
I would add sound to the black in the photo and see if it shows up at the outlet and then do the white. It is starting to look like a broken wire some where in between.
 
Could both sides of the romex be broken? The wire came from the light switch into the junction box and was connected/spliced with lugs to romex coming out of junction box. If 3 out of the four wires were open what are the chances that both sides of the romex have broken wires?
 
If it is the wire going to the garage maybe the shovel strike was a glancing blow?
The romex you a pointing out in that picture does not look like the cable at the garage wall or the garage outlet, so maybe another junction box.

What is the black cable hanging from the strap in that photo.
 
Maybe but if it was it wasn't done by me, nor my wife I don't think. We have not done any digging of the sort since we moved in.

I am not positive about that hanging wire cause it's hard to get a good look up in there because I am between floor joists and ceiling tiles, but judging from where that cable is going and the location of it, it appears it is going to two ceiling lights in the spare bedroom in the basement.

The breaker for the garage lights do not affect these two lights.

Come to think of it there are two registers up in the living room in the general area of where the romex might be going. I will pop them up tomorrow and look in there with a mirror to see what I can see.
 
This picture of the breaker box as a black cable in the center it looks more like the cable going to the garage.
Can you have a look on that and read what is written on it.

afro.jpg
 
In the pic, if you are talking about the black single wire next to the single white one. If I remember correctly I think it's coax cables for cable or internet. But I will check again when I go home.
 
Some one was making sure the red wire was not being used. we can see just the end of it on both sides here.
So there is another junction with this wire to the shinny cable that goes to the garage.

afwo 2.jpg
 
Hey all I am back again with good news. I finally fixed my problem, well at least found a solution anyways to my goal which was to get exterior garage lights working again and being able to control them from inside my house.

Here is what I did.

I had to open up the wall between the non-working receptacle(where the ext garage lights were wired to) and the next receptacle (working) with a stud in between. Then added romex between those two receps and thus providing power to the non-working one. BAM! I have power to the recep and to the lights.

But now my lights always stay on, so my solution to have control over them inside my house was getting these items and installing them.

SS13A Slimline Switch Decorator White
https://www.x10.com/x10-home-automation/controllers/wireless/ss13a.html

LM15A Socket Rocket Screw-In Lamp Module
https://www.x10.com/x10-home-automation/modules/lamp-modules/lm15a.html

TM751 Wireless Transceiver Module
https://www.x10.com/x10-home-automation/controllers/transceivers/tm751.html

So after all this time, I actually haven't fixed the wiring from my house to the garage, and at this point I am not going to be bothered spending any more time or money to fix this issue because my original issue of getting lights working has been solved.

I would like to thank everyone who provided insight, advice and any help at all. I have learned a whole bunch and am now more confident in dealing with electrical around the house.

Lastly, I apologize for the long-*** thread because of my lack of knowledge. I know it was commented on a couple of times.
 
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SNS I am with you on this one.:agree: 273 replies later; Wow!

Afrowookie I am really glad you solved your issue.:thbup: Just understand that if we (one of us) were able to actually be there and examine personally the situation we may have been able to solve this sooner than you. "Words" sometimes instead of personal examination just complicates things.

Sorry I could not have been more of :help: to you.
 
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