This all on same breaker. Left, spliced wires are hot, but do nothing and there’s no switch for them.
Wires on the right are on a switch that controls two other lights closer to the breaker.
Can I just removed the splice and terminate the hot wires into a box mounted on the rafter?
i think the spliced goes to these wires, then leads somewhere else?
I was tasked to install the lights in an annex to my sisters “new” place - an annex to a centuries old timberframe house, with a big mess of an installation. Fusebox was a total chaos, several generations of fuses, and nothing documented. So I removed the main fuse, went up the ladder and wanted to unscrew a terminal - and found myself down at the floor again. Took out measuring tools, found nothing.
Went to the fusebox, checked every outgoing line, nothing. Went back into the annex, climbed up the ladder again, but measured before I started again. And found power! I simply shorted this (carefully!), it went “fump”, and power was gone again. But while I was standing on this ladder, measuring, the multimeter suddenly showed power again!
In the end, I found out that the annex was not powered by the house, but by the neighbors house. And they obviously had put the fuse back in that I popped out for them…
Corrected spelling in title. How is “florescent” correct in the dictionary?
Wagos my man, wagos. Its wire nuts from the future.
Kill the breaker undo whatever the monstrosity is. Each hot, neutral, and ground gets its own Wago. You buy the type that has enough holes for your problem. If theres 3 hot legs that all should all go together after you remove the fixtue get (3) 3-holes (one for 3 hots one for 3 neutrals one f0r 3 grounds). Strip the hot wires so theres no bare copper outside the Wago and clip em all in the Wago, do the neutrals and grounds in their own wagos and your done. No fire haze. Safer than wire nuts and easier. And I’m not a salesman just used em before.
probably you need 12awg size (the thickness of the copper cable)
Hardware store or amazon. Seriously easy. Cheap. No need for a box. Works just as well for weird 4 wire 277v or whatever.
…just dont put hot and neutral together. Hots with hots neutrals with neutrals…
I agree with using the Wagos, as they are the best thing ever for tying wires together. Get a bunch of 2 and 3 holes, and a 25 pack of five holes. Grounds need to be continuous so they get pigtailed to the fixture under the green screw, and under the box screw if you use a metal box, which I generally use in ceilings. If your box is metal and doesn’t have a ground screw, they sell them at the hardware store as well.
I would argue that a splice should always be in a box or within a rated fixture to keep home inspectors and code inspectors happy. Boxes must be accessible. Your local Authority Having Jurisdiction may allow them to be behind a drop ceiling, but you cannot drywall over them without cutting a hole and adding a blank plate.
If you’re joining to existing, it looks like you’ll need 12 awg as mentioned above. If pulling all new you can use 14 awg since led fixtures are unlikely to ever pull 15 amps, though I rewired the outlets and fixtures in my garage with all 12 awg for future proofing and would recommend the same. You can put a 15A breaker on 12 awg but not a 20A on 14 awg.
For wire made since around 2001, yellow is 12 awg and white is 14 awg. For wire before that, you need to read the jacket.
I forgot to add, and don’t feel like editing, always buy the 250 foot rolls when you buy wire because the cost is not that much more overall and you’ll have wire left over for the next thing you find.
Thanks
It says “electrical tape” right on the package. This is fine.
/sarcasm
I asked for the provenance of such handiwork. Unclear!
If there are two hot wires for that it seems most likely they went to a switch at some point. I doubt what you have now would burn down the house anytime soon but putting them in a box is a good idea. If it was me I’d get circuit tracer and verify your hunch about them going to that old wall box. If they ended up not going there I’d just do the splice properly, shove it in a box and never think about it again.
You can terminate the wires in a junction box as long as the box remains accessible and has a cover. You might also label it with the panel slot #.
don’t label with panel slot - too often you need to move things and so those are incorrect anyway
Yeah that’s my original plan. Was unsure about leaving some wires up there not juiced
It’s preferable to remove unused wiring.
But as long as they’re in a junction box and it’s accessible, then it’s ok. But once it’s at least safe and you forget about it, eventually someone else will have to spend the time to figure it out. You saving a little time now could be someone’s much larger expense in the future
Confession time: I have a circuit halfway removed when the project got interrupted and now it’s been a couple years. People panic at the sight of bare wires, understandably, but only I know that most of it is removed so it could never be hot. That would fail an inspection and block a home sale. Do NOT do this
My preference is to always remove wires that aren’t powered to the greatest extent practicable. You don’t want someone in the future deciding they can just randomly use the wire and burn the house down.
Roof is metal rafters and the horizontal exterior roof is metal
This reminds me of a Talking Heads song. Very popular in the early 80s. Groovy intro, better than groovy chorus. Can’t remember the name for the life of me…
the box needs to be accessable. The drop ceilling counts but something perminant ceiling would not.
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