Is it cause for concern if one wall in a room by a light switch is always warm to the touch?

Answer 1

Be very careful. If the wires behind your light switch plate are hot enough to do that, you have a hazardous condition. Perhaps you should switch off your house's electricity for awhile and call someone to come out and have a look at it. I know that gets expensive, but you're very likely to have a fire with wiring like that

Answer 2

electrical stuff naturally will be warm because it is resistive but an overloaded switch will also get hot and that is not good 2 reasons 1) To much load on the circuit 2) The switch is old and needs replacing. Both of the above needs an expert to fix them If it's a dimmer switch, it can get something like 180 degrees hotter than ambient air temperature if it's a 600 watt dimmer. please refine your question is this a dimmer switch? if so its natural for a dimmer switch to do this because its actually adding resistance to the circuit to dim the lights... resistance in the dimmer switch causes the heat If this is a single pole light switch replace the switch or check for an overloaded switch Absoulutely have a look at your connections inside the switch box. Dimmer or not. If it is noticibly warm to the touch, you probably have a loose connection creating the heat and preparing you for more heat when the fire starts. since you asked the question I assume you would need someone to identify the heat source for you and fix it. The above answers do not hold wire unless you have a large wattage dimmer, even then it it needs to be looked at. overloaded circuits are protected by the breaker and the wire should be hot all the way to the load. switched don't overheat when they get old, only with loose connections. Seek help!

Too many things plugged into that outlet. Simple check is to divide total watts by the house voltage to find amps. For instance lets say that you have a toaster oven than requires 1100 watts, and a coffee maker with 500 watts plugged into the same outlet. Take the total watts (1600) divided by voltage (110) and that equals about 14.45 amps. If your circuit breaker for that outlet is rated at 15 amps, you risk the wires being heated up enough to cause a fire. Normally, several outlets share one circuit breaker, so that reduces the amount of 'load' you can put on any one single outlet.

Answer 3

Yes, unless the light switch is a dimmer switch.

Answer 4

then that would mean that you are over powering the outlet so it might explode soon and you might not any more electricity in the house

Answer 5

The two most likely possibilities: It's failing, or it's being over loaded.