Help!!!! Problem with outside wall lights.

[Ridgback]

Hi everyone, I'm new here so please forgive me if this has been asked before or seems a stupid question.

I am trying to install two lights outside my front door and am having some problems. I previously had a single light outside my front door but have built a porch and the wife wants a light either side.

The problem I have at the moment is that I can only get one light to work properly? I have power from the mains going to the light and another cable from the inside light switch to it. I have run a piece of cable from the first light to the second for power and another cable from the second light back to the switch.

The switch is a three way at the bottom of my stairs, one switch for light at bottom of stairs, one for top of stairs and the third for outside light.

When it's all wired up and I switch it on the light with mains power direct to it works perfectly but the second doesn't. However when I switch it off both lights come on but are somewhat dull.

Can anyone shed some light in this (pardon the pun), I'm at the end of my tether and am pulling out my hair in frustration.

Thanks for taking the time to read this post.

 

[riveralt]

Photograph the inside of the switch clearly showing the cables and their terminal connections.
Also a photograph of the first light cable and their terminals (highlighting the new ones if not obvious) will go someway to help sort out your problem.

 

[Ridgback]

Thanks for the prompt reply, unfortunately I don't have a digital camera and my mobile is donkeys old and has no camera. I will just try to figure it out, it will be something really stupid but as always with things like this you cannot see the wood for the trees

 

[riveralt]

Okay - from the way you appear to have wired the new installation I would say that the need for the cable from the second lamp back to the switch is unnecessary.
If the original lamp was wired directly from the switch with a live/neutral and earth then you only need to link between that live/neutral and earth at the first lamp and the live/neutral and earth at the second lamp. There was/is no need to touch the switch at all.

That way when the switch is energised both lamps will come on together.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

I have run a piece of cable from the first light to the second for power and another cable from the second light back to the switch.

Why on earth did you do that?

All you needed to do was to connect the Switched L, N & E from the first light to the second.

I fear that you know nowhere near enough about electrics to actually be fiddling with them.

Can anyone shed some light in this (pardon the pun), I'm at the end of my tether and am pulling out my hair in frustration.

• http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=electrical+circuits+101
  
  
• http://kevinboone.net/electricity.html
  
  
• http://web.archive.org/web/20080213151445/http://www.kevinboone.com/domesticinstallations.html
  
  
• //www.diynot.com/wiki/electrics:books
  
  
• //www.diynot.com/wiki/electrics
  
  

 

[Ridgback]

I installed the original outside light which worked perfectly well. I have removed the second switch cable which it seems was not needed.

I do have live to live, neutral to neutral etc, however I still find the original light works perfectly when switched on whilst the new light stays off. However they both still come on faintly when switched off.

 

[riveralt]

I installed the original outside light which worked perfectly well. I have removed the second switch cable which it seems was not needed.

I do have live to live, neutral to neutral etc, however I still find the original light works perfectly when switched on whilst the new light stays off. However they both still come on faintly when switched off.

Are you sure that you have linked the first light with the second light correctly?
The switch live to the first light goes to the live in the second light for example.
Also are you sure you haven't caught any of the insulation in the terminals?

 

[EFLImpudence]

You need to connect the new light's L wire to the same terminals as the original light - not the supply, although obviously N & E will all be the same.

Draw a diagram.

 

[Johnmelad]

• http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=electrical+circuits+101
  
  
• http://kevinboone.net/electricity.html
  
  
• http://web.archive.org/web/20080213151445/http://www.kevinboone.com/domesticinstallations.html
  
  
• //www.diynot.com/wiki/electrics:books
  
  
• //www.diynot.com/wiki/electrics
  
  

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Yes, indeed.

Shall I ask you to provide a reasoned, intelligent, adult explanation of why showing someone where he can learn useful things to help him become competent to do electrical work merits all those rolling eyes from you?

Or shall we just fast forward to the point where your abject failure to do that simply shows, once more, what a pathetic, nasty, unhinged vindictive little child you are?

 

[securespark]

Some of us show less than adult traits sometimes. Throwing abuse at posters, for example.

As for the second cable back to the switch, it could have been that the OP wanted to switch each light individually.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Some of us show less than adult traits sometimes. Throwing abuse at posters, for example.

I'm quite happy to make an exception for that pathetic, nasty, unhinged vindictive little child going by the name of Johnmelad, who delights in criticising me, and sometimes abusing me in the most foul and disgusting manner possible, without any rational or evidential basis whatsoever.

As for the second cable back to the switch, it could have been that the OP wanted to switch each light individually.

Doesn't look like it.

The switch is a three way at the bottom of my stairs, one switch for light at bottom of stairs, one for top of stairs and the third for outside light.

 

[securespark]

In terms of the switch, he could have been describing what was there before the alterations.

As with many of the written descriptions here, it wasn't 100% clear.