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light fixture wiring

2 years ago

We thought we had a simple light fixture change out, but of course not. Bought a house, trying to change the bedroom ceiling fan to a single light. My husband said the fan was on a 3 way switch, but the switches only controlled the light, not the fan motor. There’s only 1 red wire, so he thought he’d just cap it and connect the rest and be good to go. Nope. He’s tried different configurations, including a pigtail, and nothing works.

I’m attaching a photo of the wires, and I’m hoping someone can help us figure this out. We’ve done electrical before, but this is stumping us and majorly frustrating him. TIA for any help!

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Comments (7)

mtvhike
2 years ago
last modified: 2 years ago
I assume the Ikea is your new light. Did you connect white-to-white and black to either red or black? I assume red is switched and black is unswitched. Do you have a test light or some other way to confirm you have power?
Dave
2 years ago
So if the switches didnt control the fan, how did you turn it on? remote or pull chain? if the latter two, are sure there isnt another switch? i cant imagine theyd supply it with constant power.

id cap the wires, turn on the power and the switch and check with a tick tester to confirm you have power.
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Normally in a situation with a wall switch the red wire would be the wire controlled by the switch, and the black wire would be hot all the time. I cannot tell you why it's working right at this time because if you had two hot wires connected to the light, one switched and one not, I'd expect the switch still not to control the light. If it were me I'd turn off the power at the circuit breaker box, and connect just the red wire from the wall to the black wire from the light fixture. Cap the black wire from the wall.
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jolynne28
Original Author
2 years ago
mtvhike, yep, the ikea is the new light. I pulled down a ceiling fan that had a light kit. I tried capping red and connected white to white and black to black. The result was constant power. Either switch did nothing. makes sense to me as I capped the red, assume to be switch controlled.

Based on only one 4 wire into the electrical box, I have assumed the wiring order is switch to switch to light. I pulled the switch face plates to confirm red wire on each.

Dave, we have two switches that controlled the light only. The fan was operated by pull switch.

I have a multimeter and plan to cap the wires and see what the switch is controlling. Going to try and find another 3 way switch in the house to see how the fixture was wired. I should have taken a pic before I took out the original fixture…. Thank you both!
wdccruise
2 years ago
"I tried capping red and connected white to white and black to black. The result was constant power."

Right. The black and white wires powered the fan. Try capping the black wire and connecting the light to the red (switched) and white wires.

-- amateur
jolynne28
Original Author
2 years ago
Thanks, that’s what we ended up doing. There is one outlet that we discovered now doesn’t work by capping the black, but we got the light working. My husband is going to try something else to get that outlet working, but we can def live without it until we have other renovations done and can have the contractor look at it.
Thanks all!
wdccruise
2 years ago
"There is one outlet that we discovered now doesn’t work by capping the black"

The ceiling electrical box had only one black wire, right? Did you cap the black wire in other than the ceiling electrical box. If so, you probably inadvertently disconnected the black wire to the non-working outlet from its source of power.
jolynne28
Original Author
2 years ago
Yes, ceiling electrical box only had one black wire. I agree, capping that wire disconnected the outlet I assume. Been thinking about pigtails and how that could resolve the issue.

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