Replacing fax/light fixture w/ regular light

[sed1000]

I have a ceiling fan/light fixture that my wife yanked out of the ceiling today. She wants me to put a plain jane light fixture in its place. Problem is, I wasn't there to see how it was hooked up when she took it down. There are two sets of cables that come into the junction box in the ceiling, and each cable has a white, black, and copper wire. I understand the copper is the ground. This is all controlled by a single pole light switch in the room.

When I connect all the like wires together(white w/ white, black w/ black), the breaker trips and I hear a weird noise right b4 it trips. I have 1 black wire, 1 white wire and a ground wire coming from the light fixture I'm putting in. I disconnected everything, and tried hooking up a black wire and a white wire from one junction box cable to the light, and it works, but it stays on constantly, regardless of the light switch setting. I pulled out a multimeter and found the black wire is always "hot". When I hook the light up to the wires on the other cable, I get nothing. I thought I might of fried the switch, but I just put a new one in, and no luck. I have no idea where this other cable leads to. Every other outlet and light in the room works fine, even w/ that cable disconnected.

And what really gets me is when I shut off the circuit breaker for the switch and the light(same breaker), they both go dead. But the switch doesn't seem to affect the light?? Plz help! Thx.

[kactuskid]

At your switch box do you have just one cable comming into it and is the black wire connected to one side of the switch and the white wire connected to the other side of the switch. If you do, then this is called a switch loop and the white wire is actually a HOT wire and should be marked with a black marker to indicate so. If you infact have a switch loop then there is a special way to wire these up. The following link will show you the connections. Make sure the white wire is remarked at both the switch end and in the ceiling box. http://www.estevancomp.ca/tesla/switchloopdiagram.htm

[sed1000]

Hey, it works! Thanks a lot!!

[kactuskid]

You're welcome, glad it worked.