Here’s what I am up against: I have a black, white, red and bare wire coming from ceiling, and a black, white and green wire coming from fan.
According to instructions, black to black, white to white and green to bare, but it says nothing about red wires.
Through trial and error, I have discovered that both the black and red wires are hot, however, the black wire can be turned on and off by the wall switch, while the red stays on no matter what.
What I did was hook the device up per the instructions, but left the red wire unattached, putting an insulated cap on it. Is this kosher? Does the red wire have to be hooked up to something? Right now the fan is working fine, just want to make sure I’m not messing up royally by not attaching red wire to anything.
Maybe that was someone else. Does this fan have a light with it? Did the previous? It sounds like your wiring was set up so that one of them would always have poer while the other was controlled by the wall socket, or perhaps a different switch. If there is no other swithch around, and you do not have a light on your current fan you should be fine.
This sounds to me like an arrangement for a combined light/ceiling fan. In that configuration, the switched (black) wire would go to the light, while the unswitched (red) wire would go to the fan. There are usually switches on the fan housing that control the speed (including “off”) and direction of the fan, so a separate wall switch may not be required.
If what you are installing is a straight fan (with no light), then your procedure is correct.
Yes, I asked a similar question as I have installed two ceiling fans over the last month, hence “stumped again” in my OP, but the first question’s outlet box did not have a red wire that stayed hot coming out of it. My main concern here with this fan is that capping the red wire, not attaching it to anything, is alright.
As long as the cap is secure, yes, it will be fine. You may want to wrap a bit of electrical tape around it to hold it in place if there’s any question in your mind that it could work itself loose.
Electricwizardnot, welcome to the board. Please consider joining!
I had a similar ceiling fan experience. I got through it with the help of a basic electrical how-to book (my initial one was a Black & Decker edition, and I’ve bought a few more to supplement.). I also learned a lot on the www.about.com site. Also, if you Google “ceiling fan” and red and hot and wire, you’ll find a few excellent pictorials posted by homeowners. I often printed these pages to guide me. … When you shop for a how-to book, be sure to compare several editions. In some, the text is better. In others, the illustrations and photos are better.