wiring help, ceiling fan won't switch on

Jul 27, 2004 5 Replies
E

I replaced all of the switches/ouetls in my house and I can't seem to get 1 wired to a fan to work. It looks like this fan is getting power from t he switch. In teh wall box I have my hot and neutral wires and then another cable with hot, neutral, and a red wire. I assume this is coming from the fan. The red wire was NOT used.



First off, is the red wire to independantly control the light or something like this?



Next, It was previously wired so that the hot from the fan was connected to the neuitral from the wall. Then the hoit from wall and neutral from wfan went into the switch. I tried this, and it didn't work. I Then connected hots together and pigtailed it into the switch, and same for neutral. Still doesn't work.



I'm using a standard 2 -way switch, Levitron model, just like what came out of the wall. What am I doing wrong?


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I

Yes. Somebody had the foresight to wire the ceiling box to handle 2 circuits (fan & light) What they did after that is a bit of a mystery ...

Hard to tell. Maybe take a few minutes and "start from scratch" and it should work??...

Check the wires at the fan motor housing, make sure black and white from the fan go to the black and white from the incoming cable. Your fan likely has another color wire bundled with the blacks, assuming you have a light kit on the fan.

Once that's done, back to your wall box, wire the two whites together, wire the incoming black wire to the lower switch teminal, the black wre leaving the box going to the ceiling goes to the upper switch terminal. Rule of code, thumb, common sense -never to be forgotten-: Switches *always* break the hot leg of the circuit, in a normal (single pole) switch, the white wires don't get involved. Ever.

Good luck.

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T

Probably. It is good to run 3wire to fans so that the light and fan can be controlled separately.

Gosh I hope you are joking; that should have tripped the breaker. The line neutral should be connected to the fan neutral. The switch should be between the two hots.

If that doesn't work, try using the red instead of the black; maybe the fan is wired wrong.

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E

Well, I re-wired correctly and still nothing. My only thought is the fan happened to blow out? The breaker works as do the power wires because I shocked myself (oops!). And other switches on the breaker work fine.

I'm replac>

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I

OH DEER LOWERED! Wouldn't that be somethin'?? LOL

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