Electrical – Adding recessed lights to existing ceiling fan connection

ceiling-fanelectricallighting

I replaced an old ceiling fan in my sons room that had a light fixture and dimmer switch. The new ceiling fan only operates with a remote that it came with. No pull strings for the light or fan. I also want to add a couple of recessed lights so he gets more light as the fan light fixture does not give off much light.

Currently I have a armored electrical cable in the ceiling with Red/Black/White. The new ceiling fan remote receiver has red/white cable on one side and on the other, blue, black, white. I ran romex cable to the recessed cans and attached them together matching the white/black/and bare. I have the cable for the recessed lights in the same ceiling hole for the the fan ready. How do I make the connection so that the recessed lights work with a dimmer switch and the fan and fan light work with the remote it came with? We will used the recessed lighting and fan 99% of the time, and rarely use the fan light.

In the switch box, I see the armored red joined with the black from the electrical panel run. The armored black is by itself currently as I took off the old dimmer switch. And the armored white is joined with the other white from the electrical panel run.

This is a picture of my switch box. The black/red/white on the right side are the armored cable to ceiling fan.

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Best Answer

At the Light

  • Connect the white wire that leads to the recessed lights, and the white wire from the fan/light to the white wire in the ceiling box.
  • Connect the the black from the recessed lights, to the black ungrounded (hot) wire that's controlled by the dimmer.
  • Connect the red wire from the fan/light, to the red ungrounded (hot) wire that is not controlled by the dimmer.
  • Connect all the grounding conductors.

At the switch

  • Connect the LINE wire (probably black, but depends on manufacturer) from the dimmer, in with the black wire from the feeder cable.
  • Connect the black wire from the armored cable, to the switched (probably red) wire from the dimmer.
  • Connect the ground wire from the dimmer, with the other grounds in the box.

This should allow the dimmer to control the recessed lights, and the remote to control the fan/light.

Of course this assumes that power comes to the switch first, and one of the wires in the cable is always hot.

Based on the info you've provided, it should look something like this.

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According to the documentation for the dimmer, the black lead is LINE and the red lead is LOAD.

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