Can I piggyback my question on to this one? We have a battery operated light that you have to touch two points on to make it work, basically, completing the circuit.
The other day it was in the bathroom as I was showering. When I came out, the room had filled up with steam. My eyes were drawn to it and without touching it, suddenly it turned on.
Did the steam really complete the circuit and turn it on?
The steam, no. The condensation from the steam, yes.
Yes, that is what I meant, my apologies. Neat. Thanks!
Huh - How? Condensed water should be 100% pure, yes? So nothing to carry electricity, yes? So how could contact be closed?
I mean, I watched a video from PC-World where they spilled a whole mug of distilled water into a running computer, without any reaction at all (don’t try with normal water; they wanted to prove how safe a water-operated cooling system is even if it leaks).
I had this happen on a touchswitch/dimmer; it turned out to be a failing joint on the circuitboard that was easily fixed by re-soldering. But there are a lot of things that could cause the same symptoms, usually leading to noise-induced glitches in the control circuitry. The touchswitch could be fine, but a loose wire making intermittent connection would generate enough noise to get through, as would someone TIG welding in the vicinity, say.
Usual safety precautions for mains etc., don’t poke around if you’re not familiar with the procedures.
On an aside, I’m not sure I want to splash distilled water inside my PC. Even in its ultra-pure state it’s not a perfect insulator, (cite) once it gets onto a grubby circuitboard it stops being pure pretty quickly. Once it dries out it will leave behind a legacy of metal oxides on the solder joints that will grow with time and eventually eat through the circuitboard tracks. I suspect the boards in the PC World ad were conformally coated, possibly the various connectors sealed too.
There are particles in the air and also on the surface of the light switch, be it oil, dead skin cells, sweat residue, grime, etc. I don’t think you can assume that the condensation is equivalent to distilled water.
I do electronics, and have built a touch switch, my own design, not copying someone else’s. It’s minor voltage spikes, the same as your surge protector saves your computer from. Since all components have tolerance + or -, you get some more sensitive than others. The less sensitive, the sharper the spike it takes to turn on. Plug your lamp into your computer’s power strip, and it will never happen, til the power strip goes bad.
No, it wasn’t an ad, it was PC-Welt (PC-World Germany sister) TV. That is, one of the journalists made the experiment and filmed it and put the movie on the monthly CD/DVD that’s added to the magazine. Don’t know where the disc it’s on currently is, though.
The journalist claimed that it was an ordinary PC, not treated, and the same distilled water that is used in the watercooling. Even if the modern PCs sold with watercooling systems on board are specially treated, PC-Welt also advised readers to change existing PCs, since watercooling would be more efficient than the normal fan (esp. for gamers and DIY guys who overclock their processor and have high loads and thus a lot of heat). Though maybe one of the prepatory steps would be cleaning and coating the main board - I don’t remember the details.
Voltage spikes it is then. I’ve experienced it even worse since posting here - basically if I switch the light off a second later it switches itself on again and it seems to do this all the time now.
Interestingly it has gotten worse rapidly, and worked perfectly for as long as we’ve been in the house before a week or so ago. There is a tiny mechanical switch as part of the unit which I have now just switched off - we’ll use bedside lamps instead of the overhead from now on. This is a light switch in the wall, not something that can be plugged in anywhere else.
That’s the thing going bad, then, if it’s getting more frequent. It needs to be replaced.
What Cheshire Human just said. From the symptoms update I’d definitely suspect an intermittent contact, either from a poor wiring connection or a failing solder joint. The risk of a fire breaking out from the arcing is small, but best to be safe.
Do post the autopsy reports. Check for signs of burning around the screw terminals and the solder joints on the larger components.
I have the same problem. The LED bulbs I am using are Ecosmart 8.5W. They are not three-way, neither is the lamp. In fact, I have two identical lamps in the bedroom and both lights come on at the same time.
Another similar situation: The same LED bulbs in my kitchen are flashing now and then. I thought at first it was lightning.
I have to unscrew the bulbs to keep them from turning on.
I have the same LED bulbs in other places that are not flashing or turning on.
So for 7 years the Zombies have been screwing with your lamp?
:eek:
Do you have trouble having rodents in your house, it could be a mouse running around in your wall.
The three Ecosmart LED bulbs in my kitchen overhead lamp/fan are powered by a switch unit where a wireless remote switch was installed to give me a three-way operation. Those LED bulbs flash periodically, but do not come on all the way - simulating lightning flashes.
The two Ecosmart LED bulbs in my bedroom touch-sensitive side-table lamps also turn on completely periodically.
I might accept the power line fluctuation theory. None of the other Ecosmart LED bulbs are acting up, but there are three in the living room lamp/fan that are also wired up with a wireless remote. Albeit a different kind of unit than the one in the kitchen.
The switch is not turning them off fully.
The wireless switch is “bleeding” a small amount of current through the lamp, even when it’s off, and so the lamp flashes periodically. If you replace the fancy remote switch with a mechanical one, this will fix the issue.
I’m not saying it’s aliens…
Some electronics in our house acted up several years ago.
I finally checked the voltage. Too high. Notified the power company. Eventually they changed the transformer. Things worked fine after that. A a particularly noticeable one was a PC speaker system that had bad static. Very cheap AC to DC conversion circuit in it, did not tolerate the higher than normal voltage at all. After the transformer change. No problem.
This happens a lot with ‘lighted’ switches. They have a small neon light inside the switch, and ‘bleed’ a little bit of current through the circuit – enough to keep the switch lit in the dark, but not enough to light the bulb. However, when replacing the incandescent bulb with a newer CFL or LED bulb, they often can light up from that small ‘bleed’ current. You might see the bulb light up very dimly, or slightly flicker even when the switch is off. (And this will wear out CFL’s way faster than their expected life. I don’t know about LED’s.)