"Unknown" wrote:
I am very new to home repair and have a lighting outlet question. When our
house was built we had the contractor put in outlets for ceiling
fans/lights. These outlets have 4 wires. One white, one black, one red,
and one bare copper ground wire.

My question is, what is the red wire for?

I installed a ceiling light (no fan) in one of the outlets. I connected the
white wire to the lamps neutral wire (white). I connected the black wire to
the lamps hot wire (black). I connected the ground wire to the lamps ground
wire (bare copper). I left the red wire unconnected. There is a green
ground screw in the ceiling lights frame that holds it up, but I did not
connect anything to it. I also did not cap the red wire.

Am I going to burn my house down? The light works and doesn't trip the
circuit breaker. I'm just concerned about the red wire and want to know if
there is anything it should be connected to (or should it be capped).

Thanks in advance for your help.


Typically, the red wire goes to a switch to power the fan motor (that way, you
can control the lights and the fan separately). If your builder did the job
right, you have a duplex box (one big enough for two switches) with the cover
having one switch and one blank (with the expectation that if you install a fan,
you also install the switch). The red wire should go from the switch box to
the outlet box, and most likely is just unconnected at either end at the moment.
Capping never hurts, but it shouldn't be necessary.