I need some help wiring up the exhaust fan for my bathroom.
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I know wiring this should be a piece of cake, but for some reason I can not wrap my brain around how to do it.
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The drawing shows what I’ve got. The existing single pole switch has (1) back & white wire connected to the switch. I want to replace the single switch with a double switch. One switch will control the light; the other will control the new exhaust fan I installed.
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Can someone please clue me in on how to wire this correctly?
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Thanks for the help!
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Trevor
Replies
I suspect that there's an error in your existing drawing as it's ummmm... not possible.
Most likely scenario is that the switch is in line with your hot side, and the reason one wire is white is that they were too lazy to wrap it in tape or paint it to indicate that it was hot. You can verify this with a tester of course. If so, just make up a pigtail to connect both switches to the incoming hot side (probably the black) then connect your individual loads (light and fan) to the corresponding switch.
PaulB
Edited 11/14/2005 8:10 am ET by PaulBinCT
it looks like there are only two wires from the light to the existing switch......."I was an atheist, but I gave it up , due to the lack of Holidays...."
The new fan has a white wire (neutral). Where is it connected?
......to the neutral from the panel......"I was an atheist, but I gave it up , due to the lack of Holidays...."
I believe that the light is at the end of the circuit.
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According to my multimeter the white wire is the hot wire, the black is my return.
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I revised my drawings. Dose this drawings make sense?
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Thanks again for the help.
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Trevor
The set up worked fine with no problems. No moisture in the dryer. No smelly clothes. No electrical fires. I sold the house after several years and the house even passed inspection with a home inspector.Was there a better way to do the wiring?
Glad it worked for you.
Elec wise.....maybe run a feed (b/w/gnd) from the outlet to the switch, then from the switch to the fan? That way hot and neutral are on same circuit.
I am not an electrican, so I do not know if what you did (using two circuits) is up to code, safe, etc.
I'm just a guy who has spent way too much time chasing mysterious wires through houses. Keeping them together and tagging a new fixture w/ a single breaker just seems to make life easier in the future.
I'm not sure what you want is possible. The fan would need to have separate HOT wires for the fan and the light, at least. Sounds like the fan only has one hot, one neutral and one ground, which would mean they are both on the same circuit - i.e. you can only turn them both on or both off.Check the instructions to make sure what you want is possible.
It looks like you are going to have to pull a third wire down to the switch ,if you want to switch the fan and light separately. also you will have to locate the CORRECT white ..neutral...to connect to the fan ,cuz it aint the white that is on the switch now
"I was an atheist, but I gave it up , due to the lack of Holidays...."
Several years ago I bought a house with the second bathroom being in the basement. It didn't have an exhaust vent fan. It had a shower, toilet, sink, etc. My bedroom was in the basement and I used this particular bathroom.I talked to a buddy about codes and he said the bathroom did not require a vent fan since it had a window. I told him I wanted the vent fan for days after I had the mexican food platter and that I was tired of the paint peeling off the walls and he said go for it.I wanted the vent fan to run off the light switch which I could get to. My problem was that I couldn't get to the light fixture to get to the neutral. Again this was a basement bathroom and the ceiling was finished with sheetrock. The light fixture was in the ceiling.I placed the vent fan into the wall of the bathroom and it exhausted into the solid sheetmetal exhaust for the dryer which was in the next room.I simply found the closest neutral I could which was an outlet and I asked my buddy if I could use that as a neutral and he responded "sure why not".I installed the fan, got rid of the steam from the shower, got rid of the stench, and everything worked great!There is probably a better way of doing this. One of my concerns was that the vent operates on two separate electrical circuits (I think).
Again I am not an electrician and looking back I should have just hired an electrician.I may have done this incorrectly and if so this is an opportunity for everyone to learn from my mistakes.
I see,
I thought your question was relating to the problem in the post.....since he has a WHITE wire on the switch........I don't normally provide answers to these kind of posts ...I am not very comfortable doing so.......! There are other, more capable folks that will talk through the problem.remodeling electrical is hard enough without adding to the confusion or reluctance of someone who has discovered that they are now in trouble
"I was an atheist, but I gave it up , due to the lack of Holidays...."
"I placed the vent fan into the wall of the bathroom and it exhausted into the solid sheetmetal exhaust for the dryer which was in the next room."
WOW - Borrow a hot from here, a neutral from there, a vent from somewhere else.
Aside from the electrical, how do your clothes smell now?
Is there a check valve in the dryer line to prevent bathroom air from going to the dryer instead of outside?
Just wondering cause a friend had two dryers on a single vent, and every time he did laundry, the other dryer was full of condensation.
You dwg did not load for me.
But sounds like what you have is ....the power is routed to the box in the ceil (or wherever that exist light is) then from there, a "switch leg"(power down one wire, and back up the other) was dropped to the switch.
Where will the fan be? Close to the ceil light?
Can you access the ceil light box to run a wire to or from it?
Will the switches be together in a dbl box?
Best bet would be to run power from the exist ceil box, down to the new switch, then off to the fan (or to the fan first, then the switch.) I prefer the first option because it brings a neutral into the switch box (for future?), and does not leave unmarked white "neutral" wires hot.
If the exist was done this way, you would have no probs now.
No. If you have a white wire that is "hot" at the switch, it probably brings current to the switch, with the black wire taking current to the light when the switch is turned on. Or vice versa, depending on whether the switch was on or off when your read the meter. I'm assuming that you have Romex wiring. If you have only one pair of wires at the switch, then you both the white and the black are "hot" and you don't have a neutral. You must have a neutral at the fan (assuming that it's 110/120 v).
If the black wire is really the neutral, then the color-coding on the wiring is wrong, eventually someone or something is going to be hurt, and it needs to be corrected. The drawing looks more like you are running a hot wire and a switch leg to the fan, with no neutral. That won't work. Do not "borrow" a neutral from another box. That practice ends up creating a rat's nest of wiring that is dangerous for anyone who might work on the wiring in the future.
I'm not a professional electrician, although I spent a number of years working p.t. off and on as an extra hand for my ex-FIL, who is. If you don't know enough to wire the fan correctly, you really need to get someone who is qualified to do this for you.
Thanks for the help!
Trevor
You're welcome. I'm very much in favor of DIY, but if you can get someone to wire this for you, and explain the circuitry, you'll learn a bit about electrical work, without taking a risk.
Stay safe.