I have two ceiling lights in my bathroom with just a bulb hanging from them. I would like to put up shades and bought some but when I took the white bit that holds the bulb holding bit off the ceiling it had lots of wires and was confusing as to how I should wire up the new light. I am a beginner and cannot afford an electrician can anyone advise me please?
2007-01-20 23:23:03 · 11 answers · asked by dmcd1104 1 in Home & Garden ➔ Maintenance & Repairs
there should only be two exposed wires and maybe an earth, either two red /red&black or if its a new house blue,brown & green/yellow. As long as you put one exposed end into each terminal then it should not be a problem as it runs off a switch
try this link for more help
www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/replacelightfitting.
2007-01-20 23:28:15 · answer #1 · answered by EWE ANCHOR 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Generally a ceiling rose has a long strip of terminals that all the wires connect to. Most of these wires come in and loop out to the next ceiling rose or the switch.
ALWAYS turn off the electricity at the fuse box before working on the wiring. Switching the light off at the light switch may leave live wires in the ceiling rose.
You need to connect the new light fitting to the end terminals on the strip. So one wire goes in the terminal at one end and the other wire goes into the terminal at the other end.
It doesn't really matter which wire goes to which on a light fitting but you should try to connect the live wire (brown) to the end of the terminal strip that holds the red/brown wires and the neutral wire (blue) goes to the end of the terminal strip that holds mostly blue/black wires.
Hope that helps. If you are really not sure then you need to get help.
2007-01-21 07:38:43 · answer #2 · answered by Henry 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Find the fuse or circuit breaker that cuts off that circuit first. Some of those wires stay live even when the switch is off. 240V across your chest when you're at the top of a ladder isn't fun. Pull the fuse (if any) or switch off the circuit breaker. If you don't KNOW you've done it right, assume you haven't, and don't take risks.
There should be two cables at the ceiling rose (the "white bit"), each with two cores, red and black. One of those is the mains feed to the rose: live is red (240V), black is neutral (0V ish).
The other cable goes down to the switch. Red is live, black (possibly with a red band on it) is "switched live".
It goes:
live (feed cable) joins to live (switch cable) joins to nothing else (there should be a pair of copper screw terminals in the rose to let you do that - they should join to nothing else)
neutral (feed) joins to a screw terminal marked neutral or N in the rose (that's one side of the bulb)
switched live joins to the other screw terminal (the other side of the bulb).
2007-01-21 07:31:54 · answer #3 · answered by wild_eep 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Firstly if you get it wrong and there is a fire your insurance company will NOT pay out any claim as it is now against the law to work with electricity in the bathroom.
Any electrician working in there must be Part P registered.
On another side you will probably have 3 red cables all joined together that is normal you will then have 2 black on their own and 1 black on its own, put the new fitting across the 1black put to brown on new fitting and put the blue onto the 2 blacks any green cables or yellow join together (earth)
2007-01-21 08:27:21 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 2⤋
After you 'turn off' power to the circuit, simply remove the 2 wires from the existing fixture base and attach them to the leads, via wire-nuts, of your new fixture. All the other wires in the box should be left alone. They are part of the light circuit and switch relay.
2007-01-21 07:31:58 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
In the US it's white to white (which is neutral/ or hooks to the ground bar in your panel box) and black to black (which is your live or load wire/ which hooks to the breaker/fuse)
White is always Neutral, Green is always ground, any other color is presumed live or load wire.
to make this simpler just connect the new wires to the same place the old ones are.
If you have NOB-N-2, write back and I'll explain what to do. NOB-N-2 is 2 copper wires wrapped in a cloth jacket.
2007-01-21 07:50:46 · answer #6 · answered by l_du_pont@verizon.net 1 · 0⤊ 1⤋
If you are in the UK what you may have a Ring Main supply! Basically it is as it sounds - a ring - the electrical wiring goes round in a big loop and connects up to various points in the house - advice - DON'T mess with it if you don't know what you are doing!
For the initial cost of getting an electrician in to do what you want you will save yourself a lot of grief and hassle!
2007-01-21 07:32:04 · answer #7 · answered by jamand 7 · 0⤊ 3⤋
Why did you need to take down the light fittings to put up new shades?
Be careful as there are strict guidlines about electrics in bathrooms and kitchens and you may be breaking building regs by doing this yourself.
2007-01-21 07:34:05 · answer #8 · answered by Stephen N 1 · 0⤊ 1⤋
I know ya cannot afford an electrician but it might be cheaper in the long run. xxxx
2007-01-21 07:27:33 · answer #9 · answered by marshy 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hook it up the same way the existing light is, white to white, black to black, and ground to ground.
2007-01-21 07:28:26 · answer #10 · answered by jengels2002 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋