Lighting / Electrical question

Tommy Vercetti

Fitting some lights there the other day in the house which meant removing the original light fitting because I was putting up some spotlight type things. Anyway, each light had 2 neutral, 2 earth and 1 live wire. What's all that about? I've done this sort of thing before in older houses and it was always one of each.

mad m

it was probably being looped there from another light and with two sets of wires which where you found it was going to be earthed at that source and going back to fuse board thats all just twist the same coloured wires together and fit them in where they need to go....im not an electrican but just from working on sites in past years id say thats it but ill ask one for a deffo answer for ya...

dathi1

In some cases the switch wire (live) can be distributed to each luminarie by a junction box in the ceiling. Make sure you strip the cable properly to check the colour code.

Borzoi

It's common practice to daisy chain the nuetral and earths for several light fittings together, as the load on each is very small. The live wire is run then from the fuse board through the switch direct to each light. No biggie. Just keep the same connections with your new lights. If you are adding alot of spots, just watch that you aren't going to overload the nuetral/earth cable with to much current.

Victor

Be wary with spots - they heat up and/or have the habit of blowing regularly.

Tommy Vercetti

Thanks for the replies. They aren't the sunken-type spotlights, just the cheapo wooden ones from Woodies. It just annoyed me because the two wires together were quite thick which made it awkward to connect to the light itself. The house hasn't burnt down yet so I get an A+

benz

Yes there are two of each cable because the lights are looped but I hope you didn't remove any of the copper strands to make them fit easier into the connector. Doing so will reduce the cross sectional area of the cable and could cause a fire.

Kristok

Just a qiuck question in relation to this, ive got a light switch in a room on the neutral wire not the live is this save ?!? its been like this a good while (few years anyway) and also in the same room all the plugs are daisy chained from one plug live and neutral daisy chained from one plug to two others, its worked fine and i regularly have around about 8 things running at any thime which has never caused a prob but is this safe ?!? Badly done attic conversion :-(

Borzoi

Originally posted by Kristok
Just a qiuck question in relation to this, ive got a light switch in a room on the neutral wire not the live is this save ?!?

In a nutshell - no. The reason being that the light socket is still live even when the switch is off, because you are switching the nuetral wire and not the live. It's unlikely to burn your place down or anything, but the chance of someone getting a shock is much higher.

in the same room all the plugs are daisy chained from one plug live and neutral daisy chained from one plug to two others, its worked fine and i regularly have around about 8 things running at any thime which has never caused a prob but is this safe ?!?

mmm probably yes and probably no, it really depends on whether the correct cable and fuse comination have been installed!

PBC_1966

Chances are that unless it's a kitchen you're not using 8 high-power appliances, so overloading is unlikely.

In general (*), if the sockets are wired with 2.5 sq. mm cable and run from a 16 or 20A breaker or fuse, then it's a perfectly acceptable arrangement.

If these are wired as a spur from a 30 or 32A ring circuit, however, then there is the possibility of overloading the wiring should you ever connect several high-power devices to those outlets simultaneously.

(*) There's a chance that with cable bundling, cables run through hot areas etc. that this isn't the case, but it's unliekly in a domestic situation.

Tommy Vercetti

Originally posted by benz
Yes there are two of each cable because the lights are looped but I hope you didn't remove any of the copper strands to make them fit easier into the connector. Doing so will reduce the cross sectional area of the cable and could cause a fire.

I forgot all about this thread...anyway, the wires are a single thick copper strand (which made it difficult to work with), I stripped one back about 1cm and wrapped the other around that because the connector thingy in the light wasn't big enough for the two wires. I used a pliers to wrap the wires together to make sure it was tight and unlikely to unravel, if you follow me.

PBC_1966

That's not a way to guarantee a secure longterm connection, unforrtunately.

The terminals on most Irish/British light fittings should easily take two conductors of the 1.0 or 1.5 sq. mm sizes which are generally used for lighting circuits (or the pre-metric equivalents, such as 1/.044) If you couldn't fit them in, I'm wondering whether you have 2.5 sq. mm cables instead.

Tommy Vercetti

guess I better stock up on candles and fire extinguishers then