How to wire a 12V remote switch?

So if I’m following you right, (ignoring the switch for the moment) you shoud have a pair of wires leading from the power supply, and another pair of wires going out to the equipment or device that you are trying to remotely control. Now, your supply pair (the “line” side of the switch) should connect to the switch as follows:
+ to the red wire on the switch
– to either black wire on the switch
Next, your ouput pair (the “load” side of the switch) should connect to the switch:
+ to the white wire on the switch
– to the remaining black wire on the switch
Depending on how you had it connected the first time, the switch very well could have been damaged after power was applied. But not necessarily. Try using a cigarette lighter adapter and cord plugged into your car to test (the AA idea seems a little sketchy) after the switch has been wired in the manner above (disconnect your 7v device first and use a voltage tester to verify). If it works, try connecting your 7v supply and 7v device again. If it doesn’t work, then 7v is not enough to operate the relay.
P.S. Forgive me for asking, but are there batteries in the remote? :)

Sorry if I explained poorly. There is no device I am trying to operate, per se. Imagine that all I am trying to do is close a current loop; there is one wire from the positive terminal of a power source, and one wire from the negative terminal, and I need to connect the two together. In actual practice, when the circuit is completed, the current will trip another relay somewhere along the circuit, but there is no need to worry about that; for our purposes I’m just trying to wirelessly connect/disconnect the two terminals of a 7V battery. And yes, the remotes do have batteries, although it is possible that they were tuned to the wrong frequency by the manufacturer/ mismatched by the retailer.

ditto, sometmes you can hear the relay engage when you hit the button. I would hook up a 12v source and meter across the 12v out and ground to see if you get your 12v back out when you engage the relay, at least make sure that the realy works first.

From the description of the unit it might need 12v to operate the receiver.

It doesn’t appear that the product is intended for your particular application; rather a configuration that has an actual connected load, hence the 15 amp rating. I’ll keep my eyes open for one, though.

@frostgiant; I’m confused, though. It only has two current-bearing wires, and so it seems like the only thing it could do is sit on a wire (or rather, between two wires with one of its wires going to each of them) and impede or allow current from passing through that wire, using the power of that wire and of the wireless transmitter to operate. Your configuration requires four current-bearing wires.

@rottenit; That’s another problem for me, I can’t hear the relay engage. I have tried to test the relay with a 12V source, but I don’t actually have one, so I rigged 8 AA batteries (1.5V each) in series; is there any reason that wouldn’t work? My results were, as I said above, a complete lack of current, which would seem to indicate that the device is defective, or that I am wiring it wrong.

May I ask why your application would require the positive and negative wires to terminate together? Without a load between them I would call that a short. If you elaborate on the actual scenario, maybe I can visualize it.

You mean, why would I want to connect the terminals of the power source together with a single wire? As I said, somewhere along the wire there is another relay which will be tripped when current passes through the wire; the passage of current need only be momentary, so in practice the wireless switch will be opened and shut in quit succession. I know the set-up works it you manually complete the circuit by touching the two wires together; I am just trying to replace this (rather crude) manual switch with a wireless one.
Basically it looks like this (ignore the dots, they are placeholders; the lines are wires. pretend they don’t have spaces in):

- (switch) -
|...............|
|...............|(second relay)
|...............|
– (battery)-

Ah.. okay. So, referring to your original description this should work as long as the black (ground) wires on your new relay are connected in such a way that it’s derived from the negative terminal of the source.You mentioned connecting them to the “electrical housing” and other surfaces, but are these surfaces grounded via the negative terminal of the 7v source, or some other source (such as the building or dwelling ground)? I’m sure the relay needs an actual negative input to function, as opposed to an isolated grounding method.

The electrical housing is just a neutral ground, connected to the house. You are saying that in addition to connecting the + wire to the 12V in (red) wire, and the – wire to the 12V out (white) wire, I should also have the grounds attached to the – wire (and by extension the 12V out wire)?

I’m only saying that the unit needs the the negative to operate—- not sure what will happen in your case since the negative is also connected +12 out. I bet there’s a more appropriate product out there for you somewhere.

Hmm, well, I’ll look around. That, and very similar products, were all I could find so far, though. Thanks for the help!

Sure, if you can call it that! :) Sorry it was so roundabout. Electrical/electronic problems are hard to convey with words—that’s what schematics are for. I see a lot of crazy stuff at the supply houses I go to. I’ll keep you in mind in that regard.