On Mar 25, 10:12*am, DerbyDad03 wrote:
On Mar 25, 10:05*am, bud-- wrote:





On 3/25/2013 7:29 AM, DerbyDad03 wrote:

On Mar 25, 9:02 am,
wrote:
On Mar 25, 8:34 am, wrote:

I need to add a gfi outlet to my wifes bathroom. I want to add it to the current light switch box. This box currently has two switches, one for the fan,light and one for the vanity light. Each switch has a white wire, a black wire, and a ground. When checking with a voltmeter, the white wire on both switches always has power. Each black wire only has power when the switch is turned on. I am assuming the white wire is the power wire. Can I take these white wires off the switches, connect them to the top and bottom "hot" terminal on the gfi outlet, then feed the switches from both terminals on the other side of the gfi? When I did this messing around with the switches, everything worked properly. I just thought that the black wire was always the constant power wire.

First, this sounds like a hack job done by someone clueless.
The white wires should be the neutrals, not the hots.

Why do you say this is "hack job"?

If the power for the fan comes into the fixture and the power to the
vanity light comes into the vanity fixture, then it is code compliant
to use a single run of romex to bring the hot to the switch box and
back to the fixture. The switch switches the hot as it should be done..
Granted, the white at the switch should be marked with *black* tape or
marker to designate it as a hot, but there is nothing wrong with how
the switches are wired.

The NEC used to allow using the white as the power feed to switches
without remarking the wire to black (or some other appropriate color).

That configuration, albeit for a single switch, is shown he

http://i.stack.imgur.com/ZUimx.jpg

That is the way the NEC wants it done now (and was a good idea before).

I've marked the white hot with black since I wired my first circuit
about 30 years ago. I don't recall where I read about marking it, or
whether it was just a "suggestion" at the time, but it made so much
sense - especially in a fixture box where the white wire is wire
nutted to the black wires. It eliminates so much confusion and
assumptions.


We're on the same page here. My use of the term hack
job went too far. Like you, I would have marked those
wires. And I would have used the black in that Romex
for the wire that was directly live and used the white
with tape for the other side of the switch. But as is,
it's not what should be called a hack job.