Plug of War! Or why wiring in an old house is frusterating...

June 16, 2017 3:08 PM

I've been living in a new house for about a month. It's an old New Orleans house, which in my previous experiences are wrought with bad wiring. For some reason, when I turn my ceiling fan on in the living room, about 1/10 times it turns off the outlet that my television is connected to. Another outlet has the WiFi connected to it, which doesn't go out. I've tried flipping the breaker and I'm at my wit's end! I currently can't turn on my TV or anything. If anyone has any suggestions that'd be great.

Also, I rent and have a rarely-responsive landlord, so if there's anyway I could fix anything myself, that'd be even better!

posted by pineapplesunshine to Home & Garden (11 answers total)

Best answer: Well, you could open the cover where the ceiling fan is mounted and insure all the wire nuts are tight with positive contact.

But electricity's nothing to mess around with. I wouldn't recommend someone who's not sure how to troubleshoot this try to fix it themselves. Call an electrician. Send the bill to your landlord.
posted by humboldt32 at 3:47 PM on June 16, 2017 [4 favorites]

I'm guessing its a loose connection. The ceiling fan is routed through the outlet with the TV (or vice versa rather) and movement of the fan is jiggling a loose cable somewhere. Try opening the circuit on both and checking the connections.
posted by WalkerWestridge at 3:49 PM on June 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

Oh, and Im sure I don't have to say it, but just in case, make sure to shut the circuit off at the breaker, and test that both outlets are dead before opening them up.
posted by WalkerWestridge at 3:51 PM on June 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Call an electrician. It beats being electrocuted or ending up with a fire because you do not know what you are doing. My brother installed a ceiling fan in my parents' home which we later inherited. The fan stopped working, and we called an electrician to install a new one. He said my brother's wiring job was dangerous and could have caused a fire. Even if you end up having to eat the cost if the landlord wont pay, it will be worth it for your safety and piece of mind
posted by mermayd at 3:53 PM on June 16, 2017 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: Y'all are right, I really don't have the skill to be messing with it haha. I'll call an electrician next week. In the mean time though, is there any way I can get the power back on to the TV? Usually flipping the breakers worked, however it seems to not be working this time. I don't mind not having the fan on, I just wanna be able to play video games/watch netflix!

Thanks for your replies :)
posted by pineapplesunshine at 4:34 PM on June 16, 2017

Best answer: Run an extension cord to an outlet in another room.
posted by mareli at 5:45 PM on June 16, 2017 [2 favorites]

To reset a circuit breaker, you must switch it to off and then on. Just pushing it to on doesn't work. I suspect your ceiling fan is bad, in particular the switch or the run capacitor(s), not your house wiring. Just turn off the fan and reset the breaker and maybe everything will be fine until you get an electrician in.
posted by fritley at 6:14 PM on June 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

So the breaker is tripping? If it recently went off, feel the body of the better and see if it is actually warmer than the rest. If it is warm (and is a standard non-GFCI/AFCI), something is probably very wrong with the fan. If not, it's likely something wrong with the breaker. Either way you need an electrician, but if nothing is wrong with the fan or wiring to said fan, it is likely the breaker.

Unless perhaps the outlet is part of a 3 way switching arrangement with the fan and some other switch and it is wired such that both switches in either direction turn the outlet off and one on and the other off turns the outlet on. It's vaguely possible that the plug you are using for your TV was wired as a switched lamp outlet with multiple switches.
posted by wierdo at 6:42 PM on June 16, 2017

pineapplesunshine: "I'll call an electrician next week. In the mean time though, is there any way I can get the power back on to the TV? Usually flipping the breakers worked, however it seems to not be working this time."

You likely have a series arc fault. Best thing is to just leave that breaker off until the circuit can be inspected.
posted by Mitheral at 6:56 PM on June 16, 2017

Response by poster: Thanks you guys for the advice! I ended up just using another outlet with an extension cord. The circuit never tripped, I would just turn it off and on as an attempt to do the only electrical thing I know how to do.. Also thanks for the scary stories about how serious this is! I was thinking about just YouTubing it but I'm not trying to get electrocuted haha. Knowing the other issues with this house, I bet it was wired poorly when it was redone.
posted by pineapplesunshine at 8:44 PM on June 16, 2017

>In the mean time though, is there any way I can get the power back on to the TV?
No!
posted by Area Control at 11:14 AM on June 17, 2017