My basement office has a wall switch that controls the ceiling light fixture. An electrician installed track lighting and I decided to install a dimmer. The switch box has three black wires and one green. The dimmer has two black wires and one green. Apparently one switch wire is to the outlets, one is to the light fixture, but why is there a third wire. If I tie two black swich box wires to a black dimmer and the remaining black switch box wire to the last dimmer wire, is that safe? There were no white wires on the switch box, they were all tied off in the switch box.

  Add to Favorites

Apparently your electrician has used some creative wiring to wire your home.  It is very unusual not to have any white wires or neutrals in the box if he used romex wire.  One must be the hot wire, the other two are for the receptacles and the light.  If you split the black wires carefully and touch them together one at a time, you should be able to identify what goes where.  The dimmer would be installed between the hot wire and the wire going to the track lights.  If you are uncomfortable performing this, I would recommend that you call the electrician back and pay him to fix it.  Life is too short!

  Add to Favorites