Trouble With Three Switches In Bathroom

I have two 3-way switches in my master bath that have never worked properly. The house is very old and has been worked on over the years by many different people with greatly varying levels of skill. I was finally fed up with these switches and tried to fix them. I tried to follow instructions I found online, so with the power off I disconnected all the wires from both switches, then turned the power back on and used my volt-meter to discover which wire was hot. It turned out to the a red wire at switch #1. The other two wires are white and black (and yes, there also is a ground). I connected this hot wire to the darkest screw, connected the white and black to the other two screws and tried to test for continuity at the other switch. I couldn't get a reading on any of the wires at the other end. I tried turning the power back on and testing to see which wire was now hot at the second switch. It was the white wire, so I attached that to the darkest terminal, and attached the red and black to the other two terminals. The switches don't work any better than they did before I started - that is, both switches have to be turned on for the light to come on. What is my problem here? Thank you!
      

hi guys,



Im a 1st year apprentice sparks so pretty inexperienced! i have a job on during the week to wire a bathroom extractor fan in for my friend. He wants it to come on separately from the bathroom light.



Theres a 2 gang switch outside  the bathroom, one for landing lights other for bathroom. So im thinking of replacing this with a 3 gang switch for the fan.



Im gonna take permanent feed from one of the two other switches ie(bathroom or landing) to the fan switch 'common' to power it, then also take a permanent feed for the fan from the 'common' side of this new switch as its a timer fan.



Then switch feed from L1 on new switch to fan. And finally neutral from bathroom light fitting to fan. I know that these 3 cables going to fan have to be isolated at another switch before going to fan!



Am I on the right track. Thanks in advance.
      

i have 3 switch sets in my house that are giving me absolute fits.



#1  kitchen switch, controls the light over the outside door




    Code:

   

3 sets of lines coming in,



line from the breaker panel (power)



line to the ceiling lights 



line to the outside porch light.

i cannot get this 3 line to work without tripping the breaker every time i turn the switch off



#2 bathroom switches




    Code:

   

power feed line



line to the light over the medicine cabinet



line to the second switch to control the exhaust fan.

same issue as the first set, flip the switch and trip the breaker (different breaker from the kitchen switch)



#3 living room switch and plug controlled via switch




    Code:

   

 power feed line



outside porch light line



line to wall switch to control the lower wall outlet

flip switch, trip breaker



the switches i have are "1 pole" am i using the wrong switches for this job?
      

Scratching my head on this. New pole building. For now, I want to use one circuit for the lights. What I'm trying to do, is, at one door, I have a 3 way, switching two flourescent lights. Also in that 4-gang light switch, is run a light over the door on the outside, and a light over the overhead service door, and another light over the door, on the inside. So 1 3way, and three single pole switches. At the back door, the other 3 way for the same two lights, and a light over the door on the outside, and another light over the door on the inside. I have the power from the m/p, going into the light box nearest the M/P. Long story short, instead of how I have it, which operates all the lights, as long as one of the three ways are on. If someone could help me with how it should be. I am using 12-3 from the switches. Using 12-2 from the first light box, to the second. I have a another 12-2 running into each switch box, to supply power for the single pole switches.

Thanks for any/all input.
      

Going through a crazy heat wave here in SoCal, and one of my tenants called to tell me that the electricity isn't on in some of his rooms. He turned on his portable AC unit that he has been using all summer and something may have happened.



Downstairs:The dining room light switch, downstairs light switch do not work. All outlets around them do work though, which is odd cause I would have thought they'd be on the same circuit.



Upstairs: The side bathroom light switch does not work, but outlets all work. In the master bedroom (where the AC unit is located), the master bathroom light switch does not work, nor does the master bedroom light switch. All of the outlets do not work either. I used my outlet tester and it gave me the hot/ground reversed lights. I think this means that the white/black wires are reversed on the outlets (has not changed recently).



I went over, checked all of the breakers. Switched them to off, then back on, did not fix the issue. All breakers stay in the on position without tripping, so no shorts?



Checked all GFCI's, hit test, then reset, did not solve the problem.



We unplugged everything from all outlets, and retried, but it didn't work.



I checked continuity between the main power lines, and the output of the circuit breakers, and all were fine. I did NOT check the voltages though, and will do so in the morning when I stop by again.



Is there anything else I should check?
      

I've had an on-off problems with two of my ceiling fans (different makers, one hunter and one minka). Wired differently too, the minka one is controlled by a wall remote control, and the hunter one by two wired wall switches).



Every now and then, for no reason, the fan will stop working. It may stop working for a day, a week, whatever.. then start working again for a month or even a year. When this happens, the light kit on both fans still works (on the minka, the light kit and fan are on the same line, separated in the fan by the remote control receiver. On the hunter, it's two different wires going into the fan.).



It stumps me.. I'll just turn the fan on one day, it will spin a little bit, then stop. Nothing gets it to work. I can hear a small hum in its motor, like it's getting power, but it won't spin. Then a week later I may accidentally turn it on again and it will run. Two and three years ago I had repeated on/off problems with both fans. Last year, both worked perfectly the entire year. This year one of them has started acting up again.



Any hints would be appreciated.
      

I'm trying to fix a problem with a track light installment over the a bar I've just put in. I've done it before. never had issues. but this particular problem is driving me nuts. It just defies logic.  The electrician who actually installed the associated dimmer switches with this dining room area was called as it seems it may be a flaw with his wiring, but he's blown us off and I have to try and solve this myself.



This is how it's all set up. I've been rehabbing our home from top to bottom, and converted our old kitchen into a dining area. Within this dining area are four sets of lights, all controlled from one box containing four dimmer switches. I set up all the new wiring and installation of the lights in the ceiling, and we paid an electrician to come in, check everything out, set up the multiple switches, and connect it all to the board. It's all new copper wiring from beginning to end, as I didn't want to connect or splice in to the old aluminum wiring that was in place. All the new wiring and lights are on a dedicated 15 amp breaker. Three of the sets of lights were set up to be available from the day the electrician came around. The fourth, for the track light over the bar, was left hanging from the ceiling capped off and with the switch off, as I still had work to do installing an overhead wine rack, under which the track was going to be set.



Two days ago I finally got around to putting the track up, but after setting it in place and connecting the power up the lights wouldn't work. I took the lights out to our kitchen, where I installed another track light system some time ago, plugged one of the lights in, and it worked just fine. I then went back to the bar area and used a spare track, then a spare connector, to see if I could isolate the fault, yet neither of the items provided a solution. Now here's the weird bit - every time I tried checking the system out, I'd get 120 volts showing from the wiring and from the track when I'd test with the multimeter. But the second I'd put a light into the track, the multimeter would drop to zero on the voltage reading on either the wiring or the track. Take the light fixture back out, and the voltage would pop back up. Inserting the light was thus completing some kind of odd loop. It wasn't just one light - I double checked by grabbing working lights from the kitchen track and inserting them into the other track - the same problem would pop up. Finally, having come to the conclusion that there was nothing wrong with the track at all, I took the whole assembly over to a nearby wall outlet, used some spare electric cable to connect up to the appropriate slots - presto, the light came on! I even double checked all this by grabbing another light fixture destined for our bathroom, and tried connecting it to the wiring over the bar. Nothing. Yet as with the track light, the minute I took it over to the wall outlet and connected it, the light worked.



So everything logically points to the fact it has to be something to do with this individual circuit, right, because a) the light fixtures work when plugged into another circuit and b) the other three dimmers and lights hooked up in the same box work fine and draw power from the same wire cable/breaker combination. The only things left that I can think of is that the electrician has either wired the dimmer switch up incorrectly or that there's some kind of flaw inside the switch itself. Does this make sense?



A friend also told me to double-check to make sure that the black wire feeding power to the light was indeed the hot wire, and it is.  If I touch it with the black test lead from the multimeter and put the red one to the neutral I show 120 volts. If I keep the black test lead on the black wire and put the red test lead to the ground - I also show 120 volts.



A final point. I know I'm not overloading the circuit - not even close. With all four dimmers maxed and every light on - including the test light on the track - I'd only be drawing 8 amps on a 15 amp breaker, besides which I'm only using one set of lights while I'm working on this problem anyway. This is a dedicated circuit, so there's no additional power being drawn away by something else.



So how am I getting 120 volts from this wiring, according to my multimeter, yet it won't light up ANYTHING and keeps giving off the indication that some kind of loop or short is being created every time I actually plug a light into the track? It's got me totally stumped.



Anyone have any ideas?
      

Hello Everyone-

   I was hoping that someone would be able to help me connect the dots here as far as how to do the wiring for my new bathroom.   To give you the basics...



There is just one two wire power cable going to the bathroom.

I have one single unit, that has two flip switches on it.

- Switch 1 is to control the light.

- Switch 2 is to control the fan.

Then there is also one outlet, which I want to be always on, and not hooked up to any switch.



Attached is a diagram of the individual components.



Can someone help me connect the dots on how to wire this all up?  Please let me know if you need any more details!
      

Hello -



I'm attempting to install a new bathroom vent fan / light combo.  I pulled out the old one from the ceiling and am ready to install the new one.  I'm not sure how to wire up the new one.



The wire coming from the 2 Switches/Wall has the following 4 wires:  Black, White, Red, Bare Copper Ground



The wires coming from the Light/Fan Unit a

Light:  Black, White, Red

Fan:  Black, White

Fan/Light Housing:  Green Ground Wire



Any help would be appreciated.



Thanks!
      

I have a switch plate in the bathroom that has worked just fine for 6 years, now the top switch which is the light switch, wont "click" into the on position. It just springs back to the off position. The other two are to the ceiling exhaust fan, and the heater in the same unit as the fan.

The heater switch sparks now, it did not before. What can I do?

Thanks, Ellie