Wall lights & earth

sammy66 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:05 am Post Subject: Wall lights & earth

Hi, Want to replace my wall lights. One side of the room is fne with three cables as expected, but the other side only has 2, ie no earth. Wall light instructions say the lights must be earthed. Is this an expensive rewiring job or easy for a pro? Thanks.

mo2 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:02 pm Post Subject:

do you mean 3 cores or three cables, because if there are three cables at one point with three cores and two cables at another point with 3 cores, then that is OK, do you know how to connect them up?

sammy66 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 12:50 pm Post Subject: Wall lights & earth

Thanks for replying. I mean the existing lights on one wall have only two wires, blue & brown (live & neutral) and no earth that I can see. The new wall light has two cables, one contains live & neutral, the other is the earth so not sure if it's safe to connect the live & neutral ones and leave the earth.

mo2 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 1:51 pm Post Subject:

have you stripped the cable, because the earth will be bare - copper colour whereas the live and neutral will be brown/blue or red/black

Spark123 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 1:56 pm Post Subject:

It is not safe to connect the lights without an earth. It's sounding a little bit odd, has someone used 2core flex?

sammy66 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 5:50 pm Post Subject: Wall light & earth

Have looked again very closely at lights. Existing lights are connected to wall cable via plastic choc box with brown/blue wires & definitely no earth. From the wall there is however a single cable with red and black cores plus a very short bent over copper(?) wire - presume this is therefore the earth but not currently connected to lights? Thanks again for responses.

RMS · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 5:56 pm Post Subject:

This short piece of "bent over copper" will be the earth wire but you still need to ensure that this wire is actually connected to earth.

IMO if the person originally terminated the existing light in this way then other parts of the wiring feeding the lights will need to be checked/tested.

sammy66 · Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:27 pm Post Subject: Wall light & earth

Thanks for all your responses. Will get a pro in to check.

danp · Posted: Mon Nov 27, 2006 3:13 pm Post Subject:

When did the lighting circuits typically get earth ? (i.e. in the building regs)

I have a 1966 flat and the same issue, wall (and ceiling lights) do not have earth...but all the light fittings I just bought say they need earthing.

Can I earth them to the metal plates behind ? (as someone seems to have done with some of the existing ones)

OR

Do I have to re-wire all the lighting circuits ?

OR

Can I buy lights that don't need earthing ?

OR

any other suggestions pls ?!

Thanks ! Dan

sammy66 · Posted: Mon Nov 27, 2006 3:36 pm Post Subject:

We got a pro in to check ours and found out that the earths at the wall lights were not actually attached at the other end, so had to get the earths properly attached but not a long job for the pro.