Light switches On in the Off position and Vice Versa

Question

Good Morning,

I have a Levitron Two Position switch, which switches on in the OFF position.

I know a cheap fix is to just turn the switch around, but there is a label at the bottom of the switch that says says Levitron and it won't look good upside down.

I tried to switch the wires on the terminal and it still only turns on in the OFF position.

Before there was an old switch which I took out and replaced with the new two position Levitron switch after I replaced it, ALL THE SWITCHES IN THE HOUSE NOW ONLY WORK IN THE OFF POSITION.

I tried hard to switch the wires around but to no avail.

I made a wiring diagram for your convenience:

• There are three entry points into the box: From the Top, Top Left, and Bottom Left (denoted by the arrows)

• I didn't put the green wire in the diagram because the switch works without it (I am testing it with the old switch)

• The B marrett has a red and black wire was not connected to the switch and I am not sure where it originates from.

Answer 1

Standard colors are:

• Neutral: White or gray

• Safety Ground: Green, yellow w/ green stripe, bare, or the shell of non-flexing metal conduit, and metal boxes.

• Hot: all other colors.

If a multi-wire cable is used, the white can be marked with hot-color tape and used as a hot. That does not apply in conduit. Conduits need 1 neutral per circuit and it must be white or gray.

Ground NEVER EVER Goes to anything else

Safety grounds, always and only green, yellow/green or bare, are never wired to any other conductor. Period. End of subject. I don't how how in the bloody green blazes a green wire came to go from the switch's green screw to the neutral bundle, but fire the guy who did that. That person lacks the basic knowledge required not to kill somebody.

If that's you, quit and hire a pro. Seriously, what the heck.

STOP EXPERIMENTING

You've dug yourself an irrecoverable hole because your response to "it doesn't work" was to "try random stuff". By "random" I mean you don't have knowledge of what it does.

What will happen when you hit a combination that works (or works "good enough"? You stop. Trouble is, there are many combinations which will work and will kill you.

When you are stuck, stop and collect more information. I know you're not doing that because of the ground wire in the neutral bundle, which is a "101" blunder.

It may be too late

Unfortunately, you seem to have relied on a notion that no matter how scrambled you make it, there are standard color-codes or groupings that will tell a remote expert how to fix it. That belief is false, unfortunately. There are no color codes other than what I said at the top. The only way electricians tell the next electrician the meanings of the wires is by how things are arranged currently.

Now, the only path is a great deal of on-site iterative testing, which is too far beyond your skill-set to be achievable, even with support of people online. I think the option available to you is to call a pro... unless you took good photos of the starting condition that was known-working.