CA600 Burnt Ground Wire

Other Devices & Integrations Lighting & Load Control
#1

In a brain fart moment I installed a CA600 to control fluorescent lights in the garage. I turned it on once, looked up, realized what I had done, and uninstalled it. The exposed part where the ground wire connects to the CA600 now has a blackened burnt look to it. My gut tells me to not attempt to install this CA600 somewhere else because of this, can anyone confirm? Is it possible/easy to replace the ground on these units?

Thanks in advance.

#2

Listen to your gut. Throw the CA600 into the garbage.

Consider it a cheap lesson in paying attention to the instructions.

Don’t burn your house down due to ignorance nor trying to save $40.

#3

Are you certain it was the ground wire (green)? It doesn’t really connect to the unit electronics, just to the mounting flange. If it’s burnt there, it suggests there was a short. Is it possible that any other line voltage wires were exposed and might have come in contact with a ground? It looks like the ground wire could be replaced, but I’d go with Z-waver’s advice regarding not putting it back in service.

#4

My first thought when reading this is that something was not hooked up correctly such as the load and control wires were swapped, neutral wire was shorted to ground, etc.

Although the Dimmer switches are absolutely not meant to control fluorescent bulbs, hooking one up should not burn out the switch. The dimmer might make the lights constantly flicker, or burn out the ballast or bulb prematurely.

#5

Sorry it’s taken so long to get back to this, life pulled me away for a few weeks. Thanks for the responses on here.

@Z-Waver: It wasn’t an issue of not paying attention to instructions, I just completely forget I had fluorescent lighting in that room…an idiot moment.

@kkl & localuser: It seems this didn’t happen during the install (I checked my wiring and it was fine), I’ve since opened two more brand new CA600 and have noticed the same thing. Where the green shielding ends, there is a small (1/2 cm) run of black wiring before it changes color to silver. Is this something normal or do I have three bad units? The other nine I’ve installed did not have this.

I’ve attached a picture of one as an example.

#6

I pulled a new CA600 out of its box and it appears similar to what you’ve described. However, I wouldn’t describe the wire just past the green shielding as black. I’d call it gray. I think the reason it looks different is that the remainder of the wire is soldered giving it a brighter silver look. If that’s what you’re seeing, I’d say it’s normal.