alright listen, I'm a little frustrated at the moment becuase I've already been shocked to hel a couple times already today!

I got this brand new lamp for the front yard that mounts on top of the lamp post. Sounds like no big deal to install right? only 3 wires. yeah thats what I thought too.

so the dogs and I go outside this morning to play being an electrician to hock this lamp up. First thing I do is try to find the breaker in the hosue that controls the lamp outside, can't find it so I shut down the entire house of power which leaves me with the dogs running around the neighborhood becuase i forgot that when I shut the power off the Invisable fence I have up for the dogs no longer works so the dogs are running all over the damn street now and leaves me with a screaming kid that can't watch anymore TV anymore that the power is off, so I have his mother come pick him up.

easy part comes now, I take off the old lamp mount that sits on the pole. I now take the new lamp post and somehow try to hold this thing in one hand and somehow connect the wires with the other hand 5 feet in the air. This is a very large lamp post made off brass and lots of glass which holds 5 lights. I connect the 3 wires to the existing wires in the lamp post and take out a ladder to lay down the light in the air so I can run inside the house and turn the house back on of power. I come back outside and to my surprise the lamp is working! I let it sit for maybe 2 minutes before picking up the lamp now to set ontop of the pole and screw it into place. As I pick it up to set it on the post all hel broke out. All I rememebr is bright white light coming from the wires and sparks and me holding this damn thing getting one hell of a shock! I throw the lamp onto the grass and and made sure no neighbors saw what just happened. I lookd at the wires and there all melted??? I don't know why, even the stupid copper ground wire thing was crisp!

so what do I do next? I go to a hardwear store and by new wires and hock them on the lamp again and to make a long story short again, some damn thing happened as I went to mount the lamp on the post but this time when I got shocked as the sparks i thought had my hair on fire i threw the lamp again but this time it hit the sidewalk and busted my new lamp now.

so now I'm out of a lamp and have no idea why this was happenign to me? I couldn't have had the wires crossed since it was working before I touched it.

anyone shed some light on what the hell went on?

 

The biggest problem I see is you should hook it up, not hock it up. Hocking it up will cause a short every time.

 

Probably because you're a f'kin' idiot.

 

Shock occurs due to your inability to use proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

 

This explains it very clearly.

 

Funni story!

If you hooked up the wires properly you would not be able to throw the lamp.
Electricity bite you once sham on you...
Call an electrician before you kill yourself or....
Shoc youself som or com bak and tel anoder funni story

 

What did you ground the copper wire to? I believe you should have a ground, positive and neutral wire. There aren't that many combinations you can mess it up with. Can you get pictures and post them?

Why did you cut off the power to the house? Is the lamp always on, do you not have a light switch for it?

 

So wire the post temparly to a some other light when all the breakers are off, and slowly turn the breakers back on one by one untill the light is back on. You have just found the breaker for that light. Turn the others on and keep that one off, start your project and only turn the braeker on when the light is wired and reattached to the post.

Even switching the positive and neutral wires the light will work. The ground is a bare wire. simple. keep it simple.

would the post be energized from a poor connection or a chafed wire in the internal wiring?

 

You're still grounded. I can see why.

 

well apparently electro-shock therapy is no cure for bad spelling

 

dude,
i only THOUGHT my morning had gone bad when i woke up and my dog had **** in her kennel... wow

go have a cold one and call a buddy over and let him try.

Crashes Rule Of Electricity: ALWAYS let a buddy try to hook it up first.

 

Thanks, that was a good laugh!!! Laborers were not meant to be electricians! You know this and I know this. I know cause I did the same dumbass move last week hooking up a ceiling fan at my mom's house minus the spark's part. I got zinged 2-3 times but atleast the fan works now.

 

Maybe it was the Hulks.

 

lol@ the dogs

 

Anything electrical outside must be on a gfi outlet or circuit breaker fuse, fix that first before you die.