How to Fix a Touch Lamp Stuck in the On Position

Touch lamps can be repaired

Your touch lamp is stuck in the on position and you are tired of yanking the cord out of the wall to turn it off. Just as you turn it off you have to get up and plug it back into the wall to turn it on again. Repairing a touch lamp is an easy fix that can be completed with a few easy steps.

Things You'll Need

• Flat head screw driver
• Wire cutter/strippers
• Universal touch dimmer control
• Pliers
• Orange wire nuts
• Electrical tape

Instructions

1. Unplug the lamp from the wall socket.

2. Remove the bottom of the lamp using a flat head screw driver. Removing the lamp bottom will expose the dimmer touch control. Most touch lamps have a removable plastic bottom that snaps on. A flat head screw driver wedged between the base of the lamp and the bottom gives you leverage to unsnap the bottom from the base. Should your touch lamp's bottom be held on by small screws, you will need to remove the screws to access the touch dimmer control. The touch dimmer control will be either a small black or white box with four wires attached to it. One wire will be black (hot), one wire will be white (neutral), one wire will be red or grey (hot) depending on the manufacturer of the dimmer control and the final wire will be yellow with a brass ring attached to the end of the yellow wire.

3. Remove the old dimmer touch control. Remove the wire nuts to disconnect the old control from the lamp. The wire nuts are used to connect the wires together; they are small cone shaped pieces of plastic with what appears to be a wire spring inside. The dimmer control is also connected to the threaded nipple that the lamp wires run through on their way to the socket by a yellow wire with the brass ring attached to the end. A threaded nipple is a length of pipe that is threaded down the entire length on the outside; it is often used to hold lamp pieces together while providing a hollow pipe to thread wires through. Use pliers to remove the nut from the nipple and slide the ring off. If the old touch dimmer control is hard wired to the lamp, (no wire nuts or electrical tape connect the wire) use wire cutter/strippers and cut the wires as close to the old touch dimmer as possible. Strip ½ inch of insulation off of each wire.

4. Install the new touch dimmer control. Thread the lamp wires that are threaded through the nipple through the brass ring that is attached to the yellow wire on the new dimmer touch control. Replace the nut onto the threaded nipple and tighten securely. The lamp hot and neutral wires are fused together and you can tell them apart by the way they feel. The smooth side is the hot side and the ribbed side is neutral. The hot wire is the wire that provides the electricity to the lamp and the neutral wire completes the circuit. A black or smooth wire is always designated as hot and a white or ribbed wire is always designated neutral. There are two set of wires inside the base of the lamp where you are installing the new touch dimmer control. One set of two wires runs from inside the base and out to the plug, the other set runs from inside the base and up to the socket. Connect the smooth wire from the plug side of the wires to the black wire on the touch dimmer control by twisting an orange wire nut onto the un-insulated (bare stranded copper) ends of the wires to hold them together. Connect the grey or red wire (depending on the manufacturer, it could be either color) from the touch dimmer control to the smooth wire that runs up the throat of the lamp to the socket by twisting an orange wire nut onto the un-insulated ends of the wires. Connect the white wire from the dimmer control to the two remaining ribbed wires inside the base of the lamp, both the ribbed wire from the plug side of the wires and the ribbed wire that runs up the throat of the lamp to the socket by twisting an orange wire nut onto all three wires.

5. Tape the wire nuts to the wires using electrical tape. Wrapping the tape around both the wire nuts and the wires holds the wire nuts securely in place.

6. Place the lamp bottom onto the lamp.

7. Plug the lamp into the wall socket.

References

• How to Fix a Lamp: How To Fix A Touch Lamp