Callopsitte
DIY
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Good day. My daughter bought an older house and wanted to change a 240 volts baseboard heater with built-in thermostat with a convectair. We bought a Convectair without a thermostat for which I wanted to hook up a programmable wall thermostat. The new convectair instructions only say to hook convectair to line and to hook up thermostat that is not included. The convectair only has 3 wires coming out (red, black and green).
When I took the old baseboard heater off the wall I discovered it was not connected. The white (neutral) and green (ground) were connected but the black (hot) from the basebord had a marrette on it and the black from the breaker box was attached with a screw on the baseboard(!!!) She had never turned on that baseboard.
Anyway. I connected the new convectair to the wires from the break box and the new thermostat but nothing came on. *Each time I connected and disconnected I turned off breaker at panel then on to try. Tried again without the thermostat and again no heat.
Then we discovered that the breaker for that baseboard was also the same for a second baseboard. While testing the disconnected wires from the breaker box with a pen (beeps and lights when put on a wire that has electricity running) the white (neutral) was lighting my pen but the black (hot) that should have electricity in was not lighting my pen!
So it it possible the neutral and hot have been switched at breaker box (it's an old breaker box hard to access an to figure out) or is it normal because two baseboards were wired together (some kind of serial connection)? How to figure out?
Thank you.
When I took the old baseboard heater off the wall I discovered it was not connected. The white (neutral) and green (ground) were connected but the black (hot) from the basebord had a marrette on it and the black from the breaker box was attached with a screw on the baseboard(!!!) She had never turned on that baseboard.
Anyway. I connected the new convectair to the wires from the break box and the new thermostat but nothing came on. *Each time I connected and disconnected I turned off breaker at panel then on to try. Tried again without the thermostat and again no heat.
Then we discovered that the breaker for that baseboard was also the same for a second baseboard. While testing the disconnected wires from the breaker box with a pen (beeps and lights when put on a wire that has electricity running) the white (neutral) was lighting my pen but the black (hot) that should have electricity in was not lighting my pen!
So it it possible the neutral and hot have been switched at breaker box (it's an old breaker box hard to access an to figure out) or is it normal because two baseboards were wired together (some kind of serial connection)? How to figure out?
Thank you.
