Electrical – Installing a light+fan combo switch – red, black, white wires

ceiling-fanelectricallight-fixturemultiway-switch

I've started installing a fan that has me stumped. I'm not great at electrical, but have installed several fans. This is the first true combo switch I've tried though (the others being a remote-combo kit).

Here are some pictures (sorry for the size, not sure how to shrink them on here):

ceiling
wall
instr
switch

Things I've tried:

  • switch-blue -> red -> blue | switch-black -> black -> black (switches reversed, smelled burning electrical so flipped the breaker)

  • switch-blue -> black -> blue | switch-black -> red -> black (seems to work, but the fan control doesn't actually do anything, the fan just stays on)

Fan Model: 5DI52BSD-L

Switch: ESSWC-5-WH

(both are Monte Carlo brand)

If I use a normal single switch, attach both the blue and black from the unit to the red from the ceiling, everything seems to work fine still.

Any ideas what's going on?

Best Answer

Your fan control must have let the magic smoke out

That smoky smell was your fan control failing -- fan controls and dimmers typically are short-circuits when they fail, so that's why the fan ran at full speed when you tried the fan control the second time.

Leave black wired to black and red wired to blue in the ceiling box, then get another fan/light combo control and use it instead of the burned out one. You can leave the normal light switch in for now; when you get the new fan control, just remember to wire the fan side to the black wire going up into the /3 cable, the light side to the red wire going up into the /3 cable, and the incoming hot to the black wire from the /2 cable; don't forget to hook up ground to the bare wires and neutral (if present on your control) to the white wires, for that matter!