[mminutel]

I am at GHA, and one of my teachers has a problem for us to figure out. He doesn't give any hints. Anytime I ask him anything about it, he won't say anything. I do not have a picture, but I tried my best at a paint picture.

There are two regular house lights enclosed in a normal wall housing. The two lights are said to be standard house lights in a generic enclosed socket. He has no wires running under or through the board. It is powered by a simple stranded AC extension chord like you would see on a lamp. Cable A is the stranded 2 prong power cable that plugs into a regular DC outlet. Cable B is a single copper cable that is stripped to show that fact.

He will not let me take the covers off of the light sockets or the switch which makes me think something is in there. He says that he did not modify the switches in any way, but that does not mean he didn't run extra wires of some kind. It seems like a regular series circuit with 2 lights and 2 switches, but it acts like a parallel circuit. If you flip the bottom switch, the bottom light comes on, but the top light does not. If you flip the top switch, the top light comes on, but the bottom in unaffected by the switch. Is there any way this can be? I have thought about this for a while now. I know very little about AC current so I am calling on all of you to help me. Thank you very much.

 

[marvin]

That's the electrical diagram for the setup you're describing. I'll let you figure out how your prof wired it up.

 

[SysteX]

But it doesn't necessarily have to be a common ground... It could be a shared 120V line with independent switched grounds. But the concept is the same regardless.

 

[mminutel]

Yes, but the wire above is single strand. I have no idea how he would have done it without two strands. I knew that it would have to be like that, but I just don't know how he would have done it without using double wires.

 

[kevin gilmore]

add 4 diodes, one across each switch and light bulb.
in the appropriate directions.

 

[fran]

single strand from say "live" goes to one terminal of second light. Another single strand goes from other terminal of this lamp to the neutral of the other light and from there return to the neutral circuit.

Very common practice when wiring houses - run a common ring for neutral and then switch the live to each lamp.

Fran

 

[jclinton46]

Sounds exactly like something I did for a high school science fair MANY years ago (assuming you meant the device was plugged into a regular AC outlet not DC).

I had a box with 2 switches and another box with 2 lights with only two wires running between them and a regular line cord running from the switch box to a AC outlet. Inside the switch box one of the AC power lines split and in series was a selenium rectifier and a switch. Parallel to that was an identical circuit with the rectifier wired for reverse polarity. The circuit rejoined, then this single wire left the switch box to the light box where it split just like before only this time each leg had a rectifier and a light bulb in series. The "output" joined into a single wire that ran out the light box thru the switch bow and to the outlet.

How does it work? A rectifier allows current to flow in only one direction. So it will pass current flow for one half of a cycle (60 per second in the US). When the switch closes and allows flow thru the rectifier, the corresponding rectifier (and light) also allows electron flow. The other rectifier which is wired for reverse polarity blocks any flow and that bulb remains dark. Both switches closed, both bulbs lit.

Kevin Gilmore had it right, I just expanded the explanation. Not the same as done in house wiring.

Hope my explanation was clear enough.

 

[kevin gilmore]

most of you don't get it. It is a teacher trying to get their
students to think outside the box. The first wiring diagram is
in fact correct, you just have to add some hidden parts.

 

[Born2bwire]

I can't help but feel that we are wasting Senor Gilmore's talents here.

Kevin, I've been trying to rig up a simple cyclotron in my basement, but I am having trouble accelerating the particles between the Dees. Do you think that the inverse reactive current from the detector is causing immodial interaction in the magnetic flux generators? I could realign the Dees to reduce side fumbling, but this would cause unnecessary vibrations in the unilateral phase detractors. The other option would be to use a simple gasket in order to better seat the vacuum pump as opposed to a differentially forced fit shaft. Or better yet, maybe I should just dump the entire bubble chamber as my detector and move on to panametrically varying SQUID magnetometers. What do you think?

 

[cclragnarok]

EDIT: Nevermind. Kevin Gilmore already gave the answer in post #5.

 

[amphead]

Inside the switch box for each lamp, is a wireless transmitter set for the frequency of the receiver in the corresponding lamps box. The receiver turns on a solenoid that turns on the corresponding lamp, which is powered by a battery powered inverter converting back to AC. Or........maybe not.

 

[DocHamm]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kevin gilmore /img/forum/go_quote.gif Most of you don't get it. It is a teacher trying to get their students to think outside the box. The first wiring diagram is in fact correct, you just have to add some hidden parts.

Ditto. Ergo it's the easy way out to have someone else give you the answer and where's the learning in that??

 

[mminutel]

I figure most of the stuff out for myself. It is a 3 week class that is no grade, it is just for the sake of learning. He told us that he wouldn't even tell us the answer at the end of the class, and it was driving me crazy. I am 17 and I have no knowledge of the different types of rectifiers and such. The thought of using a diode in each enclosure had crossed my mind, but I ruled that out because I didn't think it would accomplish anything in an AC circuit. I have only been working with electronics for a period of about 4 or 5 months.

If I was at college for an electrical engineering degree and knew about this kind of stuff then I more than likely would not have asked for help. The fact that he wasn't even going to tell us the right answer turned me off of even trying. We were not allowed to inspect the device other than what we saw. I am sorry if you guys feel that I took the easy way out.

 

[robm321]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cclragnarok /img/forum/go_quote.gif EDIT: Nevermind. Kevin Gilmore already gave the answer in post #5.

Yep

 

[kevin gilmore]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Born2bwire /img/forum/go_quote.gif Kevin, I've been trying to rig up a simple cyclotron in my basement, but I am having trouble accelerating the particles between the Dees. Do you think that the inverse reactive current from the detector is causing immodial interaction in the magnetic flux generators? I could realign the Dees to reduce side fumbling, but this would cause unnecessary vibrations in the unilateral phase detractors. The other option would be to use a simple gasket in order to better seat the vacuum pump as opposed to a differentially forced fit shaft. Or better yet, maybe I should just dump the entire bubble chamber as my detector and move on to panametrically varying SQUID magnetometers. What do you think?

Well you obviously have a serious power supply problem here..
First you are going to absolutely need a cold fusion generator to generate
the power. Then you are going to need a 30kw BPT isolating line filter
to get rid of the ground noise (i mean its obvious you have a ground
noise problem) Then you are going to need at least half a dozen
starquad power cords, and lots (and i do mean lots) of ERS paper.
Don't forget the bybee's to make sure the quantum noise is properly
filtered.