What Happens If You Attach Black to White Wire in a Light Fixture?
Wires are connected in a specific manner to electrical receptacles and light fixtures. Improper wiring can be a fire and shock hazard. Understanding how your home wiring works is important when making electrical repairs. Does this Spark an idea?
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Polarity
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Receptacle and fixture wires are connected so that electricity comes from the circuit breaker box through a hot wire and passes through any switches and then the load. It finally returns to the box through a neutral or common wire. Turning the switch off means there is no electricity present at the receptacle or fixture socket.
Wire Colors
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The National Electric Code sets wire colors for standard house wiring as white for neutral or common and black, red or any other color except green as the hot wires. If white is used as a hot or current-carrying conductor, it should be recoded black with tape, a permanent marker or paint at the point of connection, although this is not a code requirement.
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Reverse Polarity
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Reversing the wire connections so that black connects to neutral and white connects to the hot terminals of a fixture means that it is possible for the socket to be energized even when the switch is turned off. This assumes the switch is placed on the neutral side of the circuit. If this were done, a person putting his finger into the socket would likely get a shock even though the switch is in the off position.
Wiring Two Hot Wires
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If both wires to a light fixture were black and both were current-carrying wires -- meaning they are both attached to a circuit breaker -- the light fixture may not work or the light will operate at twice the voltage as normal. It is also possible the circuit breaker would trip.
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