3d ago

Dimmer Switch Help

I have this single pole 3 way dimmer switch where I attached all 4 wires in the correct spot for my living room lantern, or so I thought. My lantern successfully worked, however, all the light switches in my kitchen either stopped working or worked not as expected.

For example, the light switch in my kitchen that's on the same wall as my living room light would only turn my kitchen light on and off if my dimmer switch was on.

What am I doing wrong? Am I using the wrong dimmer switch? More photos in the comments.

5 comments

There's another 3-way on the lights and you likely have a traveler where the switch leg goes is my first thought
As an electrician, call one. It's much simpler for us to sort this out ourselves. Call a small local shop or a self-employed one, the smaller the company the better the price usually.
- Thank you. Lowe's and Home Depot said the same thing to call an electrician so I did. Have one coming on Tuesday. It's $70 just to get a quote which sucks, but if I do go with them, it goes towards the final price. It just sucks because I'm just now noticing how weird these lights are and I just finished putting a wainscotting on the wall and painting it. I even have a light switch that doesn't do anything apparently... I'm really not wanting to pay $200+ for all of this and I imagine it would cost A LOT more.
You mixed up one of the travellers with the hot wire. You need an electrical meter to tone out the wires.
But If all you have a simple beeper, you could disconnect all wires in the affected switches. Turn the breaker back on, go back and check with the beeper, the one that beeps is your main hot wire, tag or mark the wire so you know which one it is, the other 2 are your travelers.
Turn the breaker off, tie the hot wire to your first traveler, turn the breaker back on, go to your second switch box (which you should have also fully disconnected)
Use your beeper to find the first traveller, tag it, turn the breaker back off switch the hot wire in the first box to the other traveler, turn the breaker back on, check which wire it is with the beeper in the second box, tag it.
Now you know which wires your travelers are in the second box, the last wire not tagged in your second box is the wire going to the light so that should be the common wire on your other 3 way.
Keep in mind you can most likely only use one dimmer on a pair of 3 way switches, the other switch should be a standard non dimmable switch.
The main hot which you identified first may also need to be connected to the line side of the other switches in the multi gang box. I don’t know your set up.
If you don’t understand any of this, just call an electrician, he will have you sorted in 15 mins.
Also next time with any questions please post a picture of the wiring schematic included in the instructions for the device you are installing. (it helps understand what the device needs, neutral wire etc)
Make sure all your pigtails inside the gang box are connected securely. I had this issue once and it ended up being a few loose neutral wires in the pigtail.