Over the last two days I removed an old bathroom ventilation fan that also had a heater and replaced it with a fan-only unit. The old fan and heater were run separately from a double switch, so I hooked the new fan up to the same black wire that powered the old vent fan (top switch in bathroom) and capped off the red wire that used to power the heater (from bottom switch). And attached white to white as had been before (and the ground wires on their own too). On the same circuit is the bathroom light. But that is all that is on the circuit. Bathroom outlets are on a separate circuit.

After hooking up the new fan the old fan switch turned on the fan, the old vent switch was ignored, and old light switch still turned on the light. Everything seemed fine - so even though I still needed to do some ceiling patch work I let my wife use the bathroom to shower, etc. No complaints. Then I went in later and no power to anything. No fan, no light, nothing. Circuit breaker is still in "on" position. Tried flipping it off, waiting, and back on. But still nothing. So back to the attic and checked the connections in the box on the fan unit, all okay. Checked the connections on the switch units in the bathroom, all okay. As for those switches - it seems that the power comes into the double switch units and from that switch unit a black wire transfers power to the separate light switch unit. Anyway.. no juice at all.

Only thing I can think of is that my circuit breaker fuse is blown? But if so, why? And how can I test that? What else might be going on to knock out the whole circuit?

Thanks in advance for your help.

DH

 

You have a bad connection or something broken somewhere between the breaker panel and the fan. It could possibly be at the last known live outlet box.

Are you getting juice in the switch boxes?

This is not common but cannot be ruled out. A wire could be broken inside the insulation so it does not look broken.

 

Circuit breakers don't have fuses.

 

Thanks to AllanJ and ray2047. Fact that circuit breakers don't have fuses (shows my entry level here) and the improbable chance that one particular breaker goes bad while working on that circuit focused me on the fact that it had to be a break somewhere that I had missed. Up in attic again this morning checking everything I could find and found a loosening bundle of neutrals hiding in a big cap in a box where the circuit for my bathroom fan/light splits from the circuit for another bathroom fan/light. Circuit breaker in question is part of two side by switches in the breaker box which run these two circuits. Seemed both bathroom fan/light circuits were bundled into that same cap of neutrals so I completely unbundled them and then both bathrooms were out. All back tight and both bathrooms working good. Thanks again for the help!

DH

 

Thanks for letting us know you fixed it and the cause.