Ceiling fan install - electrical question

Before I start, I'll note that I'm about 50/50 on calling in an electrician over this. I don't want to waste money and this seems like a very simple electrical install, but I also don't want to either kill myself or my new ceiling fan.

Anyway, I just bought a ceiling fan to replace another one that had mysteriously died just after a somewhat shady electrician had come in and done some work. We called him back, he tested the wiring and said we had power, so yeah, the fan was just dead. It *was* old, and a cheap piece of junk. So we bought a new one.

I decided I was going to hang it myself. I took the old one down and then used a neon tester to test the wires. I have only one black and one white wire; nothing else. I assume the junction box itself is grounded, my neon tester lights up when i touch black wire to junction box.

Problem is it *also* lights up if I connect white wire to junction box, which doesn't seem right and isn't what other sites have said should happen. Seems this wire is live, or the junction box is. Wondering if this killed my old ceiling fan.

Am I off track here? Should I call in an electrician or am I just not testing right? Everywhere I've read says black to ground should light my tester, white to ground should not.

Thanks for any help...

Reply to
basscadet75
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What you have read is correct. Something is clearly wrong with the wires at that box. There is probably nothing wrong with the old fan as well. I would call in a new electrician and show the ceiling outlet to him and show him whatever the other "electrician" touched

Reply to
RBM

What did the electrician do the first time?

Are you sure you don't have a tester that checks continuity?

Measure the voltage from the black to the box and the white to the box.

Reply to
Terry

You gotta do some more investigatin' - do you have a voltmeter?

I'd be interested to see what is inside the switch box on the wall as well, if there is one.

good luck

nate

Reply to
Nate Nagel

IF (note emphasis) the junction box IS grounded, and when you say "connect white wire to junction box" you are really trying to tell us that you are connecting one side of the neon tester to the white wire and the other side of the neon tester to the junction box, then it's odds on that the white wire is disconnected somewhere along the way from that fan junction box to your breaker panel and the neon bulb is lighting because of capacitive coupling of the voltage on the black wire to the "floating" white wire which can deliver the few microamps needed to make the bulb light.

From your writings I'm not sure you know enough about what you are doing to find the fault, but with the breaker for that circuit off, open up the switch box for the switch controlling power to that fan and see if you can spot where the white wire coming down from the fan's junction box connects, and whether maybe that connection sprung loose from a poorly installed wirenut or something.

If you don't spot anything there, I'd suggest you call in a competant electrician and have him find out what the first "shady" guy screwed up.

Maybe if you are lucky you can have the new electrician reconnect your old fan, see it run fine, and return the new fan to the place you bought it for credit.

HTH,

Jeff

Reply to
Jeff Wisnia

There is no switch that this circuit is connected to. It's a straight circuit.

What I *will* check is the connections in the junction box itself, I guess. Both the white and black wires are connected to other white and black wires in the box. I guess that connection may have come loose. All of this is some pretty old wiring, though; I don't know how it could have come disconnected, and at least by eye it looks like it's still got a solid connection.

Well, luckily I wanted to replace the old fan anyway; this just gave me an excuse. It was one of those ugly $50 fans, it was too small for the room and it's probably 25 years old. So I'll keep the new fan regardless.

I guess I'll see if I can't figure out where/if the white wire is disconnected. And maybe I'll buy a voltmeter. Let's say I test the black wire to the box and the white wire to the box, and the latter is extremely low voltage - just enough to light up my neon. Could that be ok? You can tell I know very little about electrical stuff - I know to turn off a circuit while working on it, I know how to follow instructions that say "connect the white wire to the white wire", but beyond that, I'm probably pretty lost.

I probably should have been clearer about what my earlier electrician did (I was in a hurry while writing) - he actually didn't touch this circuit before the fan died, which is what's weird about it. He was up in the ceiling in another room, and it was right after that that the fan died, but I verified by testing the breakers that he was on a whole other circuit. So I don't know what he could have done that would have affected this, but I thought it was a little suspicious.

He *did* originally move that ceiling fan from another room into the living room, but that was like a year ago and it worked fine all through the previous summer. So he *has* touched that circuit in the past, but he thought it must have been coincidence that the fan died right after he was at my house the last time, and I was inclined to agree after testing which circuits he was actually working on. But now I'm not so sure.

Bottom line question I guess is, if I buy a voltmeter and it turns out the white wire voltage is there but extremely low, should I go ahead and connect the fan? Or should I call in a new electrician regardless of anything? I have enough skills to turn breakers on and off and to test exposed wires, but no way am I going to be able to go digging around my house myself trying to figure out where a bunch of stray voltage is coming from.

Thanks...

Reply to
basscadet75

I wouldn't advise spending money on a meter just yet.

If you purchase a solid state digital voltmeter it's input impedance will be very high and if in fact the problem IS an open white (neutral) lead combined with capacitive coupling from the black (hot) wire that caused the neon tester to light when connected between the white wire and the junction box, then that digital voltmeter will also indicate that there's a voltage there, albeit without much capacity to deliver more than a few microamps of current. So, you won't have learned much more than you've found out already.

What I DIDN'T read in your posts is whether you actually TRIED wiring up the new fan to the black and white wires and it didn't work, or if you were just checking things out before installing it.

Try this; Rather than having to schlepp the fan up a ladder, just connect a table lamp's cord across the black and white wires in that junction box. You can do that relatively safely by attaching the white and black wires to the screw terminals on a duplex receptical (with the breaker for that circuit off, of course), plugging the lamp's cord into that receptical and then turning on the breaker.

If you can light the table lamp that way, chances are very good that the new fan will work OK when wired in. It the table lamp doesn't light with that connection, then it's back to being a good bet that the white wire in that junction box doesn't have a solid electrical connection all the way back to the breaker panel's neutral bar, and you or someone else is going to have to find out why that is, and fix whatever's bad.

HTH,

Jeff

Reply to
Jeff Wisnia

Checking before the install - I was worried about actually overloading the motor and/or shocking myself or my wife while turning it on. I didn't know what killed my old fan, so I didn't want to risk murdering another one by the same cause...

I will definitely try this. Hadn't thought of it before. I've even got a spare receptacle lying around that I hadn't installed yet that I can use. Thanks!

Reply to
basscadet75

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