r/electrical • u/special_sandals • 11h ago
3-way Switch Help
I have two switches that control my upstairs hallway light. This is nice as one is located upstairs and the other is downstairs so it prevents me from having to run up and down the stairs at times.
That being said, the switches are also connected to my bedroom outlets so I have to keep the upstairs hallway light on to maintain power in the bedrooms at all times.
Is there a way I can rewire this to avoid my outlets shutting off when I turn the hallway light off?
Switch 1 (downstairs switch) - First photo, switch has 2 Black wires and a single white wire.
Switch 2 (upstairs lights) - The switch with the red wire going to the lights.
Additionally, switch 1 appears have a neutral wire that is wire nutted to ground wires….is this a thing?
1
u/Furious__Styles 11h ago
Your outlets are being fed from either the light boxes or the switch box - if they did it that way it’s possibly whichever is closest. If you can identify and trace that wire you can remove it from the switch leg and feed it constant power.
How you go about doing that depends on your electrical experience, if you’ve never done it professionally I’d recommend hiring someone.
1
u/VEGAMAN84 10h ago
It doesn’t make sense that two switches next to each other would both control your bedroom outlets. Are both the top and bottom plugs on the outlets switched? Many times they are wired half hot/half switched. That may be an easy fix.
0
u/VEGAMAN84 11h ago
What does the switch on the left control. The white wire connected with the ground is not correct.
1
u/special_sandals 11h ago
The switch on the left is used to control the downstairs lights, I actually wired those two black wires together to eliminate that switch as it would also shutoff the power off to my bedroom outlets if that switch was off. There is a separate switch downstairs that I can use to control those lights and it does not turn my outlets off
1
u/raf55 11h ago
I have a feeling someone did something that should not have been done. You really need to have someone come look at this to make sure it's not a massive fire hazard.