I recently had a new roof put on, and the installers pulled out the old attic fan, leaving the thermostat box. At the same time, I noticed my lightpost outside has stopped working… so I went up in the attic to check the state of the wiring. There is 3-wire feeding into the old attic fan thermostat. For safety purposes right now, I simply disconnected everything and capped them off, but I'm thinking I likely need to actually connect some wires together here to keep the 3 way going. Attached is a photo of what the wires looked like when I found them. I think there was a white wire from the old fan connecting to the white from the line but it simply got ripped out entirely.
My question is how do I proceed in connecting potentially 2 of these wires here. Knowing that isn't the safest thing to do, I didn't want to take any chances.
Best Answer
Everything on the left side of the box is wrong, this isn't a simple matter of what to connect together. I don't know if it was the roofers that messed it up of if it was wrong to start with. However all conductors must be inside sheathing [or conduit or a box] at all times, meaning that the cable sheathing must come slightly inside the box and the cable clamped at the entrance or within 6 inches of the entrance. Second there aren't enough conductors on the left to do anything. Keep them all disconnected and capped separately.
To solve the lamp issue start with the lamp fixture and switch, test the wires for voltage, if it has power change the bulb if no power trace it back until you find power. This requires a meter of course, no practical way around that.