I'm not sure if this is a "lighting" thing or an electrical thing, but... We have an old house. It has a light at the top of the stairs to the second floor with switches at the top and bottom. When we put in a bulb, and turn on one of the switches it works. BUT, depending on the position of the two switches – I’m not sure exactly what the position is for each switch - the light gets VERY bright and quickly (seconds or a few minutes) burns out the bulb. All the wiring to the light fixture, and the switch at the bottom of the stairs are the older wire with the heavy black braided covering. The switch at the BOTTOM of the stairs has 3 wires – ALL black. There is a wire in the top left, wire in the top right, and wire in the bottom right. The switch at the top of the stairs has three wires also: bottom left is black, bottom right is white, top right is green. I don’t THINK the colors mean anything. I disconnected the switch at the bottom of the steps and with all the wires disconnected the light doesn’t come on at all regardless of switch position at the TOP of the stairs. If I connect the bottom switch bottom right and top left wires, the switch at the top of the stairs works, though “on” is down rather than up. So that’s where things are at the moment. The top switch works… This morning I took a DVM and did some testing (since all the wires to the bottom switch are black, and the one’s to the top switch don’t seem to be colored meaningfully) to try and figure out what connects to what. I connected a LONG piece of wire to a known ground and looked at what’s connected to what as best as I can. I disconnected the three wires from the bottom switch so I was only looking at things that connect at the top switch. With my wire connected to a known ground, I got: Top switch, bottom right (white) 120V Top switch in up position, top right (green) 120V Bottom switch, bottom right (black) 120v The LIGHT fixture has 2 wires, a short one and a long one. Both black. With the top switch DOWN, the SHORT wire has 120V. The fixture was connected with the black wire to the bulb on the short wire and the white wire to the “long” wire. Then, with the power off I started looking at continuity between wires and got: Bottom switch, top right (black) wire connects to the top switch, bottom left(black) REGARDLESS of the switch position of the top switch. With the top switch DOWN, the bottom switch, top right wire connects to BOTH the top switch, bottom left (black) and top right (green) (I presume when I flip the switch it’s connecting the bottom left (black) to the top right (green) The bottom switch, bottom right connects to the top switch, bottom right (white). These are the two wires that are 120V when the power is on so I presume they’re connected SOMEWHERE in some wall, crawl space, attic or other area I’m not going into. The bottom switch, top right wire also goes to the LONG wire in the light fixture (this is the wire in the light that does NOT have power on it when the top switch is on (down). When I took the fixture down, the white wire to the bulb was on this “long” wire… The bottom switch top LEFT wire connects to the SHORT wire in the light fixture – the one that has power on it when the power is on… I’m guessing that since to have just the top switch work to turn the light on and off I have the bottom right and top left wires connected, the fixture is getting 120V all the time, and flipping the TOP switch just provides a return path? I know there should be a “traveler” between the switches, but I’m NOT sure where it would connect on each switch, so even though I tested to see what connects to what, I’m still not sure how this SHOULD be wired so the switches work… FWIW, we’ve wired in 3-way fixtures many times in the house but it’s always been when WE pulled the wire so we KNEW exactly what went to what. In this case, it’s all in there, the wire colors don’t help, and I’d rather not start switching wires randomly to see what happens! I can TRY to make a diagram although I’m not sure with my lack of drawing skill a drawing help a lot. But, if needed I can try. ALSO, if it's useful I can ALSO connect my wire to ground and see what wires in the switches connect to ground? Or IF they connect to ground? I’m also not sure what other information to provide, so if you need more, let me know and I’ll try to measure what I can… SO, from the above, or with whatever additional you need, can SOMEBODY out there tell me HOW these switches should be wired so the light works from either switch, just like any 3-way, WITHOUT getting extremely bright and blowing out bulbs? I didn’t measure the voltage in the fixture, but if needed I can hook the bottom switch back up, and flip them into different positions and see what the voltage is, but it’s blown out incandescent bulbs, CFL bulbs, and currently there’s an LED in there, and I suspect if I give it a chance it’d blow that out too… So, ideas? And “you’re screwed” is a valid one. It’s NOT worth rewiring the whole area just for this switch, so if the answer is “you’re screwed”, the bottom switch gets a cover plate and we only use the switch at the top of the stairs. But I can’t imagine it’s been this way since originally wired, so I’m HOPING somebody, sometime wired one of the switches wrong and it can be easily fixed. Thanks for any help you can provide...

I decided to put another Zooz 3-way switch in my kitchen. This is what I wired and it's still not working. The red and white traveler lines are exactly the same from switch 1 to switch 2. I've tested continuity with a multimeter.