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I don't know too much about wiring and such, but I can get my self into trouble. At the church I go to there is a set of chandeliers (4) in the sanctuary. Each one of them has two sets of lights in them. There are two breakers, one controlling one set, the other controlling the other set. There are no switch's we use the breakers to turn them on and off. The problem I see is that one night I went to turn them off, and the one set of lights wouldn't turn off. I thought the problem was the beaker. After looking at the labeling on the door of the box, it says that breaker (5) also turns them off. When I flipped the beaker, they turned off. The breaker that we use normally is not 5; I think its 4, but the labeling saying what it does is blocking the number.

Now to try and wrap this up, I don't understand and don't know how safe it is to have two breakers go to the same place and turn on and off the same lights.

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  • You're saying that you used to use breaker 4 to turn off the lights, but now breaker 5 turns off the same lights?
    – Tester101
    Jan 14, 2014 at 12:05
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    Does the status of breaker 4 affect the lights at all? Is it possible someone re-wired the breaker on you?
    – Jason
    Jan 14, 2014 at 16:11
  • Nothing has been changed in the box for over 6 years. If breaker 5 is on then 4 wont do anything. but if 5 is off the 4 will turn them on and off. and vise versa
    – user19241
    Jan 14, 2014 at 21:35
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    It seems clear that breakers 4 and 5 are both connected to the lights. Thus if either one is on, the status of the other one does not matter. This is not safe because assume breaker 5, for example, is off and someone turns breaker 4 off to turn off the lights. Then if someone tries to work on the lamp thinking it is safe since breaker 4 is off, and then someone turns on breaker 5, that someone could be injured. You definitely should look into this; call an electrician if necessary.
    – Barry
    Jan 15, 2014 at 1:57
  • See also diy.stackexchange.com/questions/29078/… and diy.stackexchange.com/q/8645/22
    – Bryce
    Jan 15, 2014 at 6:36

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If both 4 + 5 must be on for the lights to be on, that's weird but safe.

If 4 turns on the lights, then (with 4 off) 5 turns on the lights, call an electrician.

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