How to Install a Light With Two Switches

• 1). Cut off power to the circuit at the fuse box. Set your new electrical box in place for the new switch, affixing it to a stud with your screwgun and drywall screws through the screwholes in the side of the box. Affix it so the bottom of the box is 48 inches from the floor. Let the box sit a half inch out in front of the stud to allow for drywalling.
  
  
• 2). At your existing electrical box, disconnect all the wiring and remove the old switch. The switch should be attached to a black wire from the fuse box and a black wire to the light. Each black wire will be part of a two-wire bundle with white wires. The two white wires will be connected to each other with a wire nut. Disconnect them. Also disconnect the bare grounding wires from each other.
  
  
• 3). With your screwdriver, disconnect the bracket in the bottom or the back of the old electrical box to release the wire bundle that leads to the fuse box, and pull that bundle out. Leave the other wire bundle (the one that leads to the light) connected to the electrical box.
  
  
• 4). Pull the bundle of wire away from the existing electrical box, and string it into the new electrical box, securing it with the provided bracket. The wire should now run from the fuse box to the new electrical box.
  
  
• 5). At your new electrical box, string in your new three-wire bundle and separate out the wires: white, black and red (plus a copper grounding wire).
  
  
• 6). Wire your new three-way switch by securing the black wire from the fuse box to the top receiving screw on the switch. Fashion the wire into a hook to wrap it around the screw, then tighten the screw. Attach the other black wire (from the new three-wire bundle) to the bottom screw in the same fashion, beneath the first black wire. Attach the red wire to the screw on the other side of the switch. Tie the white wires together and the copper wires together with wire nuts.
  
  
• 7). String the new three-wire span to the old electrical box, which should still contain the wires that lead to the light. Install your second new switch in the old electrical box as before, connecting the two black wires and one red wire to the switch and tying the two white wires together and the two copper wires together.
  
  
• 8). Secure all connections with electrician's tape, screw the switches into their boxes, and hook up the electricity. Either one of the switches should turn on the light, regardless of which position the other switch is in.