Any electricians here?

I'm doing some renos in my basement and ran into an interesting (to me) problem.
My freezer has an extension cord running to it from an outlet in the hall and I don't like that.
I decided to put an outlet closer to the freezer in a box that was already on the wall next to the furnace.
There is wiring from the breaker panel going straight to that box where it connects to wiring going upstairs to my jetted tub. It looks like the box is just used where they joined the wires together rather than running wires all the way from the breaker panel to the tub.
There is a circuit breaker in the panel that's labeled "tub jets". When I turn it off the jets dont work.
In the box there is a black wire and a white wire from the breaker panel connected to black and white wires going to the tub. The box is also grounded through the green wire.
I figured it would be easy to just install an outlet in the box so I did that.
I disconnected the wires where they were twisted together and hooked them up to the outlet. Black wires on the right side, white on the left, ground to the ground terminal.
Now when I plug the freezer into the outlet it turns on but so do the lights in my downstairs bathroom, but not quite at full brightness. When I turn on the light switch in the downstairs bathroom the lights go to full brightness.
When I shut off the breaker for the tub jets upstairs the lights in the downstairs bathroom still work by the switch so to me that again proves they are on a completely different circuit.
What am I doing wrong?
Could there be counter EMF from the freezer compressor motor powering up the downstairs bathroom lights through the breaker panel?
Or?
What do I do to fix this?

 

I'm not an electrician, but I do know a fair amount about electricity, and this makes no sense.

I do think that the correct way to add an outlet to a junction box is to get new twist locks and power the outlet from new wires jumpered from the twist locks to the outlet. I don't think that an outlet is meant to be used as a junction.

I bring this up because if you didn't get the outlet screws good and tight, you could be getting less than optimal voltage to your freezer and or your tub. This can cause problems, but I just don't see how it would cause your situation.

By the way, is your circuit breaker adequate for the tub and the freezer? If it's marginal, you may have problems with it popping while you're running the tub jets.

Might be interesting to put a meter on your bathroom switch and see what you get. One side should always be at 110, and the other side should be 0 when off and 110 when on. That's if it's set up correctly. If the hot is wired too the light (not safe), it will read 110 when it's off and 0 when on.

In any event, you could see what it read when you used your other stuff.

Something is very odd.

hj

 

I'm not an licensed electrician either, but I've done enough of my own to know some things.
Likely a circuit is backfeeding and I would return the wiring to the old configuration for your own safety until you figure it out.

HJ is right, in your situation the new outlet should be pigtailed into the existing wiring splices and the bathroom light should not be switched on the neutral.

You mention a green wire, so I'm going to assume this box is piped in EMT and THHN is pulled into it.
All green wires should be tied together AND to the box itself.

If it is a metal box that is grounded and the receptacle is rated for it you don't really need another ground wire going to the receptacle.

In your case you should first know the startup draw of both the freezer and the tub motor.
Is the existing wiring and breaker rated for that combined load?

If so, then determine how much volume the junction box is rated for.
Every wire, connection and device going in is counted against this volume.
If you need more volume you can use an extension ring or raised cover to increase that volume.

The NEC is written for a reason but electron behavior is not so complex.

 

I would also recommend that your tub be on it's own dedicated GFCI protected circuit.

 

As would the current NEC....

 

Not an electrician either but I would return things as they were. I would run the freezer on a separate circuit straight from the electrical panel. Most codes call for a separate line for refrigerators so why not do it that way for a freezer? Makes sense doesn't it? Why a separate line for refrigs or freezers? Say you have several items on a refrig/freezer line and it trips the breaker, food spoils if you are away on vacation....big mess to clean up when you return.

 

Ditto Dedicated circuit for the freezer.

 

Jim -Megawatt00- the moderator, would be a good person to answer this question.

 

That line just might be a 220V line and you could, be back feeding the nuetral (white) side of the circuit with another hot (black) leg. The breaker may not be tripping as a dead short because there may be enough resistance in the freezer electrical to stop that.......for now.

This is not a case of harmonics nor EMF. As much as a PITA that it is the only safe and legal way to do this is to run a separate line box from your main panel. You gotta keep the family safe