bathroom fan replacement


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Old 04-09-08, 05:16 AM
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bathroom fan replacement

I bought a bathroom fan/light/night light to replace an existing one that was too noisy. The old one had regular plugs that went into a wall-type socket installed in the ceiling. In the ceiling there are two sets of wires, each having one black, one white and one ground. One set is hot the other isn’t – the hot ones went into one side of the socket and the other set went into the other side. There is a wall switch inside of which there are two pairs of black and white wires. One pair went to the switch and the other was capped off. The fan and the light went on/off together although they had their own plugs. The new unit does not have plugs; the instructions demonstrate how to wire it into the house when the house is being built, rather than as a replacement. The unit does have black and white wires (in addition to blue and red ones for the night light which I really don’t care about). My question is: can I put plugs on the ends of the wires on the unit and plug it in like the old one? I’ve tried connecting it directly to the power, but either everything goes on regardless of the switch or nothing at all. I don’t care if the night light works and I don’t care if the fan and the light go on/off together. The link to the instructions is: http://broan.com/ImageLibrary/broan/...s/99043991.pdf


Thanks for your help!
 
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Old 04-09-08, 06:11 PM
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Did your old unit have two separate plugs - or just one that ran both the fan and the light at the same time. Did the wall switch run both the fan and the light at the same time on the old unit?

You "can" install this one.... but let's take the time to find out what you've got and how to do it properly....
 
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Old 04-10-08, 06:48 AM
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Hi,

Yes the old unit had two separate plugs and the wall switch ran both the fan and light at the same time.

Thanks for your help!
 
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Old 04-10-08, 07:06 AM
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Okay, this could get involved, but isn't truly difficult.

The prettiest thing to do will be to run your wiring from your new fan into the current box that contains the old outlet - and put a blank plate over the old box ($0.79 for the plate). The ugliest thing to do will be to attach a plug to the new fan/light fixture and hook it up like it used to be.

With the old fan assembly removed, can you see/feel the electrical box that has the outlet?(Let's turn off the power to that circuit at the main panel before feeling around)...

This could take a while as there is no point in me typing all the details till I know what you want to do....
 
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Old 04-10-08, 10:06 AM
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I'm not exactly sure what you mean by pretty and ugly since once all this is connected and working, it will be concealed in the ceiling. Anyhow, whatever is safest and easiest is fine with me.

I could see the old outlet in the ceiling. I took it out because the new fan doesn't have plugs and the instructions showed something different. I can easily put it back. Basically, the outlet was just a few inches from the old fan.

And yes, the power to the circuit is turned off :-). BTW, the fan is on it's own circuit.
 
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Old 04-10-08, 07:52 PM
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Oh, I got you.. the box is behind the ceiling... OK..

Your wall switch has a white wire AND a black wire hooked to it, correct? If so... let's leave it like that and move forward

Before making connections, make sure all wires run in to the back of the box through the small holes in the back. For your original wires in the box - We'll call them the hot set and the not hot set. Hook your black hot wire to the black/not hot wire. Wrap a small stripe of black tape around the end of your white/not hot wire (signifies that it is serving as a hot wire for future reference). Tie that marked wire (white/not hot) to your black wires (both) from the ceiling fan. Tie the white wires from the ceiling fan to the white/hot wire (neutral). Tie together all the bare wires with the green wire. Trim any visible copper from the red/blue wires to avoid shorts - and wrap electricians tape around the ends for the same reason. Put a blank face plate on the electrical box for safety.



Should make you "good to go"....

I'd like to know where that other set of wires in the switch box go to/come from..... makes me wonder if it was originally set up to control the fan/light separately.....
 

Last edited by thezster; 04-10-08 at 08:18 PM.
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Old 04-11-08, 06:22 AM
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Thanks, for your help! I'll give this a try when I get home - or maybe in the morning after a good night's sleep!

I do believe the fan and light had separate switches at one point. I think there also used to be a heater as well. As I said, the light and fan always went on together which is fine since 90% of the time that's what we'll want anyhow - there's a completely separate light and outlet over the sink, so it's not like we're running the fan to brush our teeth.
 
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Old 04-12-08, 07:45 AM
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Good Morning!

It worked perfectly! Thank you so much for the help!
 
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Old 04-12-08, 07:56 AM
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Glad to help....
 
 

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