Light turning off when plugging cords into nearby outlet...

[pete6032]

So I bought a brand new floor lamp with standard bulb base and put an LED bulb in it. The floor lamp plugs into the outlet on the north side of my living room. If I plug something in to the socket on the south side of my living room, say a laptop or phone charger what have you, it will cause the lamp to shut off. Is this a cause for concern about faulty wiring? What is causing this to happen? I haven't ever gotten a shock and my home has pretty modern wiring.

 

[herm0016]

I would think the 2 outlets are daisy chained, and something in the plug that you are putting the 2nd device into is amiss, replace that outlet. at least that is where I would start.

 

[Greenman]

I would think the 2 outlets are daisy chained, and something in the plug that you are putting the 2nd device into is amiss, replace that outlet. at least that is where I would start.

Could be as simple as a loose wire. Seen that happen several times.

 

[Steltek]

Yeah, loose terminal wire on that south outlet. Or, if the person who wired it was lazy and used the push connectors on back of an outlet instead of the terminals, the south outlet might need to be re-wired or replaced.

 

[Jimminy]

One other thing: If the floor lamp is one of those fancy jobs with electronics, like touch switch, remote control etc, possibly a tiny voltage disturbance (when other stuff plugs in) causes it to trigger. A long shot though.

Try a known working plain appliance to see if the same thing happens. If so, its probably loose wire, bad outlet as others mentioned.

 

[Jimminy]

Could be as simple as a loose wire. Seen that happen several times.

Yep, happened to me about a year ago. Turned out a wire nut wasn't tight enough. Spent a while finding that out

 

[mindless1]

You need to pull that south side outlet out to try to identify the cause. If it is just using the push-in contacts on the back, hopefully there is enough slack in the wire that you can connect it properly to the side screw terminals.

If it is instead already on the screw terminals but one is loose, it may have already created some heat or arching and depending on how degraded (whether the other screw terminal on same side is still good and unused) might need the outlet replaced.

Unfortunately this makes the wiring to every outlet suspect, assuming same person did many if not all of them the same way.

Also if you have residential grade outlets, any frequently plugged and unplugged ought to be replaced with commercial grade outlets which have better contacts that keep their spring tension longer, especially if the powered gear uses a lot of current (which your laptop and phone charger obviously do not). If unsure which grade they are, there are some youtube videos showing the construction differences, at least of the popular brand Leviton.

 

[pete6032]

One other thing: If the floor lamp is one of those fancy jobs with electronics, like touch switch, remote control etc, possibly a tiny voltage disturbance (when other stuff plugs in) causes it to trigger. A long shot though.

Try a known working plain appliance to see if the same thing happens. If so, its probably loose wire, bad outlet as others mentioned.

It is an LED floor lamp with touch switch. I'm guessing there is some stupid little change in voltage thing happening and the light is just super sensitive.

 

[mindless1]

^ I suppose with the dirt cheap construction of LED bulbs today, something like that is possible, but the change in voltage would still come from bad wiring or outlet(s). Your laptop or phone charger is a small change in current relative to the total the circuit should be capable of, and so small to be trivial if you don't even have the laptop plugged into the PSU and charging at the time.