My garage has a light connected to a switch and a garage door opener. The garage door opener was hard wired to a line coming out from the space between the porcelain light fixture and the ceiling. The opener was not connected to the switch.
The garage door opener died. I am having a new one installed. The salesman told me I must have a ceiling plug installed before they will put in the opener.
I shut off the power, went up and opened up the fixture. The guy that wired this up some 35 years ago had two lines going into the light box. inside they were wired together and one set came out around the base of the porcelain fixture and into the garage door opener. It looked like a kluge but worked for 35 years.
I could not imagine why the lines were twisted together, since the light is connected to a switch but the opener is not. but I needed to separate them so I could pull out the garage door opener set and connect them to a receptacle I installed in the ceiling as required by the installer. I did so and the receptacle works fine. But the light does not light.
Now there are four wires in the light box: black, red, white and ground.
None have power now. I tested each pair with a multimeter with the switch in both positions. Nothing.
Any ideas as to what might be up here?
Thanks in advance.
Best Answer
Open up the switch box, and have a look how it's wired. Without more information (photos, diagrams, etc.), the following information is an educated guess.
One of the colored lines (red, black) is likely always hot, while the other is controlled by the switch. The white is most probably neutral, and the bare/green is almost certainly ground.
If this is the case, then connecting the devices is simple.
Again, this is a guess based on the limited information you've provided.