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[dhouston]

There's a chandelier in my dining area. I had 5 15W incandescents in it and decided to try these instead...
http://www.amazon.com/Lightvita-6-pack-0-36-Watt-Replacement-Candelabra/dp/B00TR5EMGW?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00

They glow very faintly when the (standard) wall switch is off. It's a three way switch arrangement and I've no idea how they/it are wired.

Any ideas?
 

[Brian H]

I saw a similar thing on another automation web site.
Do the switches have an indicator in them that glows when they are off?
The small indicator bulbs in the switches may pull a small amount of current through the load to light. Incandescent bulbs will not glow. Other loads like small LED bulbs may glow on the small current the indicator bulbs are drawing.

[dhouston]

No, these are just plain old standard switches. They probably date back about 50 years to when the building was new.

The incandescents did not glow but the current was probably close to nada, especially with the higher resistance of the filaments.

[bkenobi]

Faulty switch?

[dhouston]

Faulty switch?

My initial thought, also, but it is the same whichever switch is 'ON'.

[dave w]

Gotta be some leakage somewhere. Could any of the toggles be the old ones that have neon bulbs/resistor in the toggle piece? My guess is, with your state of health, it will be a dismissible puzzlement. But if building has maintenance person, maybe get them to check voltage at the fixture as you toggle both switches. Definitely intriguing.

[dhouston]

Just standard ~50 yr old switches. I won't try to troubleshoot it myself - just changing the bulbs aggravated my neck. But, as they are in the process of updating and remodeling, I'll alert the complex manager. They've used the same maintenance man for many years and we've become best buds in the 5 years I've been here. He's good so he'll probably find it. I'm thinking some type of ground fault but I'm not an electrician.

[dhouston]

The complex manager has an electrician replacing all of the old fuse boxes with breaker panels. He doesn't think there's any problem with a slight voltage at the light fixture so I guess I'll have to troubleshoot it after all. I've ordered a socket outlet adapter which will let me plug in an extension that I can then look at on a 'scope to see what's going on.

There's a switched outlet in the LR and a ceiling fan chandelier combo in the BR which I can check also to see whether it's unique to one circuit or is wider than that.

[dave w]

There's a switched outlet in the LR and a ceiling fan chandelier combo in the BR which I can check also to see whether it's unique to one circuit or is wider than that.

Well, I'm interested in knowing what you find.

[dhouston]

I've checked a two-way switched outlet in the LR as well as a helicopter-drone sized fan/chandelier in the BR. They are both OK. As it is tough for me to reach overhead while also seeing what I'm doing, I'll wait until my niece is here Friday to get my meter on the offending fixture. I did manage to replace one LED with a screw-in outlet so I'll have her plug-in a short extension so that I can reach everything and still see where I'm sticking the meter leads.

Now that I think about it, in the 5 years I've been here, a couple of fluorescent tubes and ballasts have failed both in the kitchen and bathroom so I'm wondering if they are all related.

[dhouston]

My meter shows 10VAC. I've a nephew who is an electrician. I'm hoping he can find time to come by and analyze this.

[timlight10]

Sounds like a loose or open neutral

[dhouston]

Sounds like a loose or open neutral

That's my guess, as well.

[dhouston]

I think I finally understand this.

As I noted earlier, they were doing some rewiring of the apartment complex when I encountered this. Shortly thereafter I also started having problems with a Tripp-Lite UPS which had been trouble free for 5+ years. About once each day and always in the morning, the UPS would briefly interrupt power to my main PC (on the same breaker as the chandelier). I assumed this was also connected to the wiring changes since it started at about the same time. The UPS has 6 power protected outlets and 6 surge protected outlets. I plugged a low wattage lamp into a surge protected outlet and waited for the next power interruption. When it came and did not affect the lamp it was apparent that the the UPS was faulty.

I replaced the UPS a week ago and there have been no power interruptions since. And, when I tried an LED in the affected chandelier, the faint glow (and the 10V) when off is now gone. I think the UPS was spewing some high frequency noise.

[4Dfuture]

I know it has been 6 months since a post was made on this, but why start a new topic?

I have about a dozen SR227 X10 SuperSocket Receptacles and use most of them for window candles.  When I recently replaced all the incandescent bulbs with LEDs I noticed with the receptacle turned off, all the bulbs still glowed.  An electronics maintenance man where I work  suggested putting an incandescent in the circuit to absorb the small load.  This is impractical for me, and I don't really mind the candle bulbs on low during the day.  In your case I don't think it would look great either to have one different bulb in a chandelier, but somehow your UPS seems to have done the trick for you.

I've been using X10 for over 25 years but this is my first post.