pull cord wiring

[bigfatporkpie]

can anyone help?

Our old pull cord light switch in bathroom broke the other day. I bought a new one and, when i wire it up, it keeps knocking off the fuse for all the lights in the main fuse box downstairs. What am i doing wrong?

There are three wires, a red one, a black one and a green one. The red is on 'com', the black in '1' and the green in '2'. I copied this from the old light fitting which had red in 'com', black in 'a1' and green in '2'.

 

[badgerchief]

the green should be connected to the box`s earth terminal

 

[badgerchief]

the green should be connected to the box`s earth terminal

 

[Steve]

porkpie, you clearly have no idea how a lightswitch works.

I shall explain.

A switch is a simple contact. In one position, the switch connects COM to L1. When you pull the string, the switch connects COM to L2. Thus your light connected to L1 would be dead. L2 is only used for 2-way switching, but this is much more advanced for today's lesson.

So what you've done is connect live to earth . . . . not very clever . . .

 

[bigfatporkpie]

Thanks for the reply.

Sorry, so you're saying i should keep the red in 'com' as this is the live wire and leave the black in '1' as, when these two meet, this brings light. Right? What about the green wire, where can i put this - there seem to be no other places.

You're right about me not knowing much (i.e anything) about how this all works!

 

[rebuke]

The green wire (actually I suspect it is green/yellow, or bare copper with sleeving over it) is earth, and should be connected to an earth terminal. There might be one in the backbox for the switch, or on the plate of the switch separately, if there isn't one on either (which is possible if everything's plastic), then just get a bit of choc block and terminate it into that...