Terry wrote:
On 13 Jan 2007 20:41:25 -0800, "jmDesktop"
wrote:


I am trying to replace my light switch. It had an older switch and had
three screws on it. On these it had black, red, and white attached.
My new one had three screws, but one of the screws was for ground. I
didn't have any place to put the white wire.

On the top screw I put red and white and on the bottom screw I put
black.

It works, but is this correct?

Thank you.



It should work just fine until you find the other mate to that switch.
I think you will find that the other switch now does nothing.

If by "do nothing" you mean "trip the breaker" than yes.


3 way switches are to control lights from 2 spots. You now have a
single pole switch. If you are ok with just using that switch then it
is fine.


No, it's not - when the other switch is flipped the hot will be directly
connected to neutral... see recent thread about deliberately shorting
circuits to find the controlling breaker to see why this may be a bad
idea. I'd replace the switch with a proper 3-way ASAP also find the
mate to that switch and verify proper operation.

nate
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