Electric; 3-way switch question

[atch]

Sweetie has me changing out all of the ivory switches/outlets/covers in the house for white ones.

I'm nearly done but saved the hardest for last. We have a room that has a combination light/ceiling fan.

At the door there are two single gang boxes with a 3-way switch in each; one for the light and one for the fan. Each box contains a 4 conductor cable coming into it; black, red, white, and bare ground. The black is 120V hot in each box. There are NO wire nuts in either of these boxes; the 4 conductors went to the 4 posts on the old switches. The reds and whites are travelers.

Over in the far corner there are two more 3-way switches. Again one for the light and one for the fan. HOWEVER; these two switches are in one double gang box. There are three 4-wire cables coming into this double box. The bare grounds are all tied together and have leads going to each switch, so we'll skip over them for now. Let's name these three cables east, center, and west.

The wires in the east cable are:
red - goes to the lighting switch
black - goes to the fan switch
white - is tied into a bundle

The wires in the center cable are:
red - goes to the fan switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)
black - is tied into a bundle
white - goes to the fan switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)

The wires in the west cable are:
red - goes to the lighting switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)
black - is tied into a bundle
white - goes to the lighting switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)

The three wires tagged "is tied into a bundle" are wire-nutted together and never went to any of the old switches.

I've used a multi-meter and extra loose wiring to determine the 4 travelers.

QUESTION #1:
On 3-way switches; one post (green) is obviously the ground. There are two posts on one side and one post on the other side. Are the two posts sharing the same side the travelers and the lone post for the hot/line?

If this were only one light or fan with two 3-way switches it'd be a piece of cake to determine the hot/line and traveler wires and connect accordingly. I'm befuddled, though, by this setup.

First thing I did was connect up the ground to the green post; connect the travelers to the side of the switches with two posts, and connect the 4th wire to the post on the side by itself.

When I did this I duplicated the wiring that was on the old switches. i.e., the wire to the single post to the single post and the two wires to the posts sharing a side to the corresponding two posts. I did this on all four switches.

b-t-w; I have no way of knowing if the fan & light are between the switches or at the end of the circuit after the switches are wired together.

QUESTION #2:
Anyone understand how to connect these?


I wish I could contact the original electrician, but that's not possible.

 

[AntonLargiader]

The common on the 3-way switches should have a black screw, so the other two are travelers.

 

[Git]

You are right, it can be very confusing...

First thing I do is take pictures - noting what wires are attached to what screw on the switch.

Next thing is to pull the existing switches and then try to identify which wire is actually the 'Line' coming from the panel and which wire is the 'load' - going directly to the light. Once you know where these two wires are you can then figure out what you have and use one of the setups on line as a guide

examples
http://www.electrical101.com/3way-switch-wiring-using-nm-cable.html

 

[Bert_]

Three-way switches have a "common" identified by a darker colored screw. Make sure the wire attached to this screw goes to the common on the new switch. The other two wires don't matter. It's really that easy.

 

[mm08822]

Sweetie has me changing out all of the ivory switches/outlets/covers in the house for white ones.

I'm nearly done but saved the hardest for last. We have a room that has a combination light/ceiling fan.

At the door there are two single gang boxes with a 3-way switch in each; one for the light and one for the fan. Each box contains a 4 conductor cable coming into it; black, red, white, and bare ground. The black is 120V hot in each box. There are NO wire nuts in either of these boxes; the 4 conductors went to the 4 posts on the old switches. The reds and whites are travelers.

Over in the far corner there are two more 3-way switches. Again one for the light and one for the fan. HOWEVER; these two switches are in one double gang box. There are three 4-wire cables coming into this double box. The bare grounds are all tied together and have leads going to each switch, so we'll skip over them for now. Let's name these three cables east, center, and west.

The wires in the east cable are:
red - goes to the lighting switch this is the return hot wire to the ceiling outlet for the light connected to S3 point (or common)
black - goes to the fan switch this is the return hot wire to the ceiling outlet for the fan connected to S3 point (or common)
white - is tied into a bundle this is the hot wire (switch leg) down from the ceiling outlet. Being white and hot denotes it as a switch leg

The wires in the center cable are:
red - goes to the fan switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)
black - is tied into a bundle the white in the east cable. Goes to the black term of S3 (point or common)
white - goes to the fan switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)

The wires in the west cable are:
red - goes to the lighting switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)
black - is tied into a bundle the white in the east cable. Goes to the black term of S3 (point or common)
white - goes to the lighting switch (is a traveler to the switch by the door)

The three wires tagged "is tied into a bundle" are wire-nutted together and never went to any of the old switches. makes sense

I've used a multi-meter and extra loose wiring to determine the 4 travelers.

QUESTION #1:
On 3-way switches; one post (green) is obviously the ground. There are two posts on one side and one post on the other side. Are the two posts sharing the same side the travelers and the lone post for the hot/line? The common (or point) of a S3 will be colored as either black or the darkest of the 3 screws

If this were only one light or fan with two 3-way switches it'd be a piece of cake to determine the hot/line and traveler wires and connect accordingly. I'm befuddled, though, by this setup. It's 2 pairs of 3 ways fed by a switch leg, fan and light return back to ceiling on 2 separate wires

First thing I did was connect up the ground to the green post; connect the travelers to the side of the switches with two posts, and connect the 4th wire to the post on the side by itself. Use the screw color coding as mentioned above

When I did this I duplicated the wiring that was on the old switches. i.e., the wire to the single post to the single post and the two wires to the posts sharing a side to the corresponding two posts. I did this on all four switches.

b-t-w; I have no way of knowing if the fan & light are between the switches or at the end of the circuit after the switches are wired together. (as mentioned above - a switch leg down from the ceiling outlet. neutral was never brought down-not needed.)

......

 

[atch]

to all who responded,

THANX! The key here is that the black screw is the common. I thought that the "lone" screw was the common. I reconnected using the black screw and voila!, all is well.

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mm08822,

Thanx for the detailed explanation. It all makes sense now.

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Note: I'll be copying this into an MSWord file and saving for future reference.

 

[rburke65]

Bl@ck screw on a 3way switch will be the hot feed in the circuit.

 

[exranger06]

The feed for this circuit goes into the fan box first. This would be a 2-conductor cable (black, white and a bare ground - the ground doesn't count, since it normally doesn't carry current. Thus it's typically referred to as a 2-conductor cable). The black is the constant hot and the white is the neutral. They connected the neutral directly to the fan/light, as you don't connect neutrals to switches. Then they ran a 3-conductor cable (again, the ground doesn't count) from the fan box to the 2-gang box in the corner of the room. (This is your "east cable.") In the fan box, they wire-nutted the black feed wire to the white wire on the east cable. Thus the white wire in the "bundle" in the 2-gang box is the feed. Then they ran two 3-conductor cables from this switch box to the switch boxes by the door. Since the black wires for each of these cables are wire-nutted to the white feed wire, the switches by the door are "fed" first. These black wires connect to the common screws on the switches by the door. The white and red wires, as you said, are the travelers that go back and connect to the switches in the 2-gang box. Finally, the red and black wires in the "east cable" connect to the common screws on the switches to be the switched legs for the lights and fan.

By the way, all of these white wires should have some black electrical tape wrapped around the ends (or color the end of the wire with a black permanent marker) to indicate they're not being used for a neutral, if they don't already have it.