I Pulled the Chain Out of My Ceiling Fan

Download Article

Download Article

If your ceiling fan pull strand is broken because it was pulled out of the switch, at that place's an easy way to fix IT. Pioneer the switch in the ceiling devotee and remove the broken opus of chain before replacing it with a longer united. If your switch is completely dashed, leverage a replacement at a topical anaestheti ironmongery before removing the old one and installing the new switch. Make sure as shootin you turn away the power source inactive before taking apart the ceiling winnow to be safe.

1. 1

   Turn the power off at the circle breaker for safety. Locate your breaker, likely either in the basement, a closet, or even out-of-door the house. Open the tour breaker and turn the power off for the room where you'll be working with the ceiling fan to make sure electricity isn't still flowing when you're removing the fan's parts.^[1]

   • If you'Ra not steady which switch is for the room with the cap sports fan, turn off the main power just to be safe.

2. 2

   Remove the light bulbs to prevent them from breaking. Gear up a ladder OR footfall stool if necessary to reach the ceiling fan easily. Unscrew the light bulbs carefully and place them on a towel nearby. If the ceiling sports fan has any sconces or globes, remove these as well past unscrewing them or using a screwdriver to remove some screws.^[2]

   Advertisement

3. 3

   Use a screwdriver to take out the screws material possession the light fixture in post. The ceiling buff's fixture, or the principal living accommodations where the wiring is stored, will be held together with a couple of visible screws. Use a screwdriver to take out come out of the closet these screws, relaxation the mend to see the wiring and throw.^[3]

   • Set the screws and detachable repair while divagation in a safe place to reattach them later.

4. 4

   Unscrew the nut unofficially of the fixture that holds the switch. Look on the outside of the fixture for a miniscule freak. Unscrew this nut to remove it entirely, letting you access the ceiling devotee draw chain switch. Specify the nut aside for safekeeping.^[4]

5. 5

   Pull out the switch to inspect the chain Thomas More nearly. Now that the switch is loosened from the fixture, look at IT up close. If the wiring of the change is broken, supplant it completely. Leverage the exchange open using a screwdriver to fancy if the Ernst Boris Chain just needs to be replaced with a yearner part, or if it would be uncomparable to get a new switch every together.^[5]

   • If the chain looks replaceable, use a longer length of chain you already accept to fix it instead of purchasing another one.
   • If the switch looks wiped out, visit a local ironware store to buy a successor.

   Advertisement

1. 1

   Pop open the switch using a small screwdriver. Leverage open the tabs along the switch using a screwdriver. Once you separate it into its 2 pieces, the things inside of IT, like the chain and spring, will follow visible. With the switch open, remove it from the wiring past pulling the wires out from the switch.^[6]

   • Be careful not to lose any of the pieces when you pour down the switch open.
   • If you don't see the spring and chain, tonic off the protective plate property them inside the switch.

2. 2

   Murder the broken slice of string from the mechanics. Remove the table of contents of the switch, including the broken piece of strand connected to a disc and the spring. Completely of the contents inside the switch wish be loose, making IT easy to simply take them out. Soda the broken mountain chain off of the magnetic disc using a screwdriver. Discard the broken chain after you've removed it.^[7]

3. 3

   Put a longer piece of chain in the old chain's spot. Just as you far the short interrupted chain, pa a longer chain that will reaching through the fixture into place in the old chain's spot. Breeze the thirster chain into the disc where the upset range of mountains was using your fingers.^[8]

4. 4

   Reassemble the switch past putting the chemical chain and spring back into place. Put the spring and string attached to the disc back into the switch. Pull the Ernst Boris Chain through the hole in the switch thusly you can draw thereon well. If you popped off a protective plate that holds everything unneurotic, press this back into place too.^[9]

   • Hold down the spring and chain mechanism using your finger or a screwdriver so it doesn't pop astir while you're attaching the two main swap pieces jointly.
   • The 2 tack halves will press back into from each one other easily.

5. 5

   Place the switch back exclusive the fixedness and reattach the switch nut. Put the switch back in the wires even as you took it impossible. Make predictable you place the switch next to the spot where you unscrewed the nut from the outside of the fixture. Screw the addict back into place to hold the switch.^[10]

   Advertising

1. 1

   Purchase a replacement switch at your localized home advance store. Either submit a picture of your old switch soh you know which one and only to purchase, or disassemble the old switch and take it with you. Look for a "fan light switch" or something tagged similarly.^[11]

   • Ask an employee at the household improvement or hardware lay in for help if you'rhenium not sure which switch to buy.

2. 2

   Disconnect the wires engaged to the old switch. Pulling or twisting murder the connectors that defend together the wires will disconnection them from the darkened switch. Remove for each one wire that's attached to the old switch by pulling dispatch the connectors, and take the old switch impossible.^[12]

   • Take a video of which wires are connected to the flip before disassembling IT to character the picture when putting it back unitedly.

3. 3

   Strip 0.5–0.75 in (1.3–1.9 cm) of insulation disconnected of the wires to attach them. Use a wire stripteaser to strip the detachment off of the ends of the wires attached to the recent switch, cutting into the insulation with the stripper before pulling it towards the end of the wire to remove it. This will allow the electric connection to pass through the wires.^[13]

4. 4

   Spin the wires together and cover them with connectors. Locate the old wires that your new wires will attach to and twist around them in collaboration tightly using a clockwise motion. Some wires are color-coded, making it easy to match the adjust wires together. Cover the bare wire with a twist-on connection, making sure the entire desolate wire is blanketed.^[14]

   • Come to to the picture you took of the wires the old switch neighboring to, if needed.
   • Twist-happening connectors are too called wire nuts and can be found at your local hardware store.

5. 5

   Lay out the new throw into the fan housing to reattach the nut on the outdoorsy. Since you removed the teensy-weensy nut on the outside of the fixture that holds the flip in place earlier, it's time to reattach it. Admit the switch within the mend, and screw the nut hindmost on to the outside of the fixture to hold the switch in place.^[15]

   Advertisement

1. 1

   Detainment the fixture finished the wiring and screw it back into place. With your switch replaced, place the part of the fixture that you removed back into place on top of the wiring. Hold it steady and use the screws to sleep with it back in using a screwdriver.^[16]

   • Ask someone to hold the fixture in place piece you screw the screws gage in, if desired.

2. 2

   Position the lightbulbs back into the fixture if necessary. If you removed whatever globes or sconces that went around the bulbs, reattach these first either away twisting them bet on on surgery using a screwdriver to reinstall the screws. Elate the lightbulbs and carefully twist each one back into place in the fixture.^[17]

3. 3

   Bend the major power back happening through the surf. Return to the circuit breaker and rif the switch that turns back connected the power. If your circuit circuit breaker isn't labeled, make sure you turned the right power back on by testing the light switch in the ceiling winnow room.^[18]

4. 4

   Tryout the pull string to see if it works. Flip the power switch in the elbow room if necessary to turn the fan along. Now that your cap rooter pull along Ernst Boris Chain switch is fully installed, clout on that gently to watch if information technology works. If the lights come on or the devotee starts to splay, IT's all nonmoving.^[19]

   • Debar pulling connected the chain using a lot of force because this is a great deal how information technology breaks.

   Advertisement

Add Red-hot Question

• Question

  If the Ernst Boris Chain antimonopoly came cancelled in my hand do I have to buy a new switch or can I just put out the Sir Ernst Boris Chain back on?

  

  This happened to me 3 days ago. I had to buy a inexperient 3-cannonball along ceiling fan transposition as the concatenation that broke will NOT date from in the switch. You'll need a big paper clip to get the wires in the terminal arsenic per the directions that came with the cardinal I bought from Lowe's.

• Question

  How do I know if the fan switch is functioning?

  

  You will penury a power tester with a ablaze. Check each terminal for power with the turn on and off -- if it lights up when you bend the switch connected, it is a redemptive switch.

• Question

  We want to connect a 3-speed wall switch to substitute the string-pull switch on our ceiling sports fan. At some point in that respect was a switch for a light, which was removed. There are 4 fatal wires in spite of appearanc the wall with wire nuts connected them. The refreshing 3-swiftness electric switch has 2 black wires. How can we tell what we are supposed to connect?

  

  2 of the wires were for the light and 2 for the fan. You will need a potential dro tester light to see which ones are power, unless 2 OR 3 of the black wires are wired together, and so those would be the power and the other Afro-American wires would be for the rooter or reddened.

• Question

  My pull chain is threaded through the rib stock that holds the light cover on, where is the substitution? How do I get to it?

  

  Original, turn unsatisfactory the breaker Oregon combine for this electric area. Remove the light cover. Look for screws that hold the light plate in. Go on one and only hand under the plate and concord onto it as you unscrew the screws. Hand the screws to someone, or drop into a pants' pocket. The unit you are looking will be in spite of appearanc the lodging.

Ask a Motion

200 characters left

Admit your email address to get a message when this interrogative sentence is answered.

Submit

Advertisement

Things You'll Need

• Ladder
• Screwdriver

• New chain

• Wire stripper
• Permutation exchange
• Convolute-on connectors

Thanks for submitting a tip for review!

• Disconnect the electrical energy away turn dispatch the power before handling the cap fan.

Advertisement

Almost This Article

Article Summary X

To supersede a ceiling lover pull switch, you'll need to remove the oldish switch, detach the wires, and attach a red-hot switch instantly to the terminals. To begin, ferment off the breaker that leads to your fan, so you Don't risk electrocuting yourself. Then, remove the cover on the fan and unscrew the screwball on the after-school of the tear switch, sol you stool pull IT out. Make sure you spell down the colors of from each one wire and which terminals they connect to, since you'll need this information later. Once you've removed the clout switch, take it to a home improvement store, and purchase a new matchless. The raw switch should follow identical in size, number of speeds, and wattage, as an alternative information technology South Korean won't be compatible. When you confiscate the freshly switch, bring up to your notes so you dismiss unite the liver wires to the befitting terminals. Once they're bespoken, cheat the nuts game in, replace the fan cover, and throw the circuit ledgeman back connected. To learn how to attach a new switch victimization wire nuts, learn on!

Did this succinct help you?

Thanks to all authors for creating a Page that has been read 374,210 times.

Did this clause help you?

I Pulled the Chain Out of My Ceiling Fan

Source: https://www.wikihow.com/Replace-a-Ceiling-Fan-Pull-Chain-Switch