Lighting switch wiring

rogert · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 8:11 pm Post Subject: Lighting switch wiring

Total novice but am replacing light switches in hall and landing after decorating!
One switch has caught me of guard!
It turns on a light in the loft and has a neon which lights up when on.

At the back is a rectangular boxwith connectors at each corner. The top 2 say IN, bottom 2 say OUT. A red wire goes into top and bottom left connectors and a black wire goes into the top and bottom right connectors.

I have a replacement switch with a single common at the top and L1 and L2 at the bottom. It has no neon.

How do I wire the new switch with the 2 reds and 2 blacks from my original switch?

RF Lighting · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 8:16 pm Post Subject:

Providing the switch definatly does only the loft light, then you need to put the two black wires in to a piece of strip connector, one of the reds (the feed if you can identify it) into the 'common' terminal and the other red (the switched live) into the L1 terminal. You do not need to connect anything to the L2 terminal

rogert · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 8:21 pm Post Subject:

Thanks> I don't know which is the feed! Will this cause me problems?

RF Lighting · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 8:41 pm Post Subject:

No. It will work either way round but it is convention to put the feed in the common terminal. The feed should have been connected to the terminals labled as either 'supply' or 'feed' on the old 20A DP switch that you are removing.

rogert · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 8:47 pm Post Subject:

Thanks again. You are a star!

securespark · Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 10:05 pm Post Subject:

Hope your new switch is correctly rated for the circuit you have attached it to.............

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