On Feb 23, 3:27�pm, Kate wrote:
mg wrote:
On Feb 18, 9:44 pm, Kate wrote:
My home is 11 years old, and it came with a battery-operated doorbell
which has worked great, but now it needs replacing.

I noticed when I took the old push button off by the front door that
there is a red and a white wire behind the button. �Does this mean the
house is wired for a wired doorbell? �The back door area has the same
colored wires.

I cannot find any place where I would install the box inside. �I have
checked all closets, etc.

Can anyone tell me if these wires are indeed for a wired doorbell, and
where the inside wires would be for the box?

I hope I explained this fairly well.

Thanks.

Kate

On Feb 18, 9:44 pm, Kate wrote:
My home is 11 years old, and it came with a battery-operated doorbell
which has worked great, but now it needs replacing.

I noticed when I took the old push button off by the front door that
there is a red and a white wire behind the button. �Does this mean the
house is wired for a wired doorbell? �The back door area has the same
colored wires.

I cannot find any place where I would install the box inside. �I have
checked all closets, etc.

Can anyone tell me if these wires are indeed for a wired doorbell, and
where the inside wires would be for the box?

I hope I explained this fairly well.

Thanks.

Kate

Hi Kate,

I'm an electronic engineer and I've also had lots of experience with
house wiring. I've also had nothing but trouble with my door bell for
about 30 years. After I retired, I finally got around to fixing it and
adding an extension door bell in a room I added on years ago. The job
turned out to be even dirtier and more difficult than I thought it
would be.

In my case, the problem was that the door bell wire they used in my
house was extremely brittle. Every time I would fix it, it would break
again, close to the bend or the loop where it screws on to the door-
bell button, after a few years of going through the summer heat and
winter cold and being used over and over again. Another problem I had
was that the transformer was located in the basement ceiling which was
sheet rocked over before I bought the house. I don't know how much of
that brittle, single-strand wire there is floating around, but that
could be one reason someone might have converted your house to a
wireless system.

The first thing I would do to fix your doorbell is go up in your attic
directly above where the doorbell is, inside your house, and find the
wires that are connected to it. There are 3 components to a door bell
system: the bell or chime, the outside doorbell button, and the
transformer. Once you find the wires above your door bell, in your
attic, you will need to follow the wires until you find the
transformer and you find the wires going to the doorbell button.

Once you find the transformer, check to make sure the wire connections
are good and check the transformer output with a volt meter. It should
measure roughly 16-18 Volts AC. If there is no voltage on the outputs
then you need to check the AC connections. To do this you will need to
turn off the appropriate circuit breaker in your house first. If the
AC connections are good and there is still no output you will need to
replace the transformer. You can buy new ones at Home Depot, for
instance.

If you try to follow the wires, but cannot find the transformer
because the wires disappear in the wall, for instance, then you need
to tap into the wires and make sure there is 16-18 Volts AC present.
If there isn't, I would just cut the wires and install a new
transformer and put it close to the manhole in your attic so that's
easy to find next time.

You will also need to locate the wires going to your front door bell
button. After you have done this, connect them together at the door
bell end, and put an ohm meter on the other end to make sure you have
continuity. After you have done all this and replaced some of the
wire, if necessary, just reconnect everything and you will have a
working door bell system.

If you don't want to do all this, you'll understand why I put the job
off for 30 years.

http://www.hrrc-ch.org/images/DOORBE...0SCHEMATIC.JPG

Thanks so much. �A friend is coming over Sunday and he wires all
of his new homes. �I will print this info. out.

I can't wait to get a voltmeter hooked up to all of these wires and see
where we go from there.

I will post an update.

Many thanks for taking the time to write this.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

ask neighbors where their doorbell parts are, can save tons of time
and effort let alone unnecessary holes in walls.