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The stove controls the lights in the kitchen

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    Is this established behavior or was it always like that? If the first then find the fault, for the second get the lights fed from a different supply prior to the stove.
    – Solar Mike
    Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 4:55
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    Are you all of a sudden having problems all over the house? Because that could be a lost neutral, which would be very serious. Or is this a "just the stove and kitchen lights" problem? Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 5:02
  • This would be really convenient if you needed to bake and didn't have time to turn on the lights.
    – Z4-tier
    Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 5:02

1 Answer 1

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Call the power company and report an outage

You lost one of your phases of power. This is almost always a problem at the power company's end of the wire.

When you turn your oven on, it has the effect of connecting the dead phase to the still-live one. However this gives very weak power on the dead phase, and this won't hold.

Go to your breaker panel and shut off all your double-wide (2-pole) breakers - oven, dryer, water heater, air conditioner etc.

Then call the power company and report the outage. They should come out quickly (unless they're busy recovering from the bad weather of late), and the work will be free.

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  • Is this different than a dropped neutral situation? In other questions it seems a dropped neutral is a serious emergency. Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 7:20
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    A dropped neutral and a dead phase are similar, in that both are power outage emergencies that need immediate attention from the utility company. They are different in that a dropped neutral is likely to overvoltage your 120V appliances, while a dead phase rarely might overcurrent the neutral wires in your MWBCs. Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 10:43
  • Yeah exactly@whatsisname... if you lose a phase, you can limp the house along for awhile on one leg using only 120V loads... but if you lose a neutral, you are sunk - you dare not use 120V loads or you'll fry stuff or start a fire. Commented Feb 24, 2021 at 20:14
  • Worst that could happen is the power company shows up & informs you the busted leg is on your side of the box (relatively unlikely); then have an electrician fix it. Commented Feb 25, 2021 at 15:48

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