ceiling light stays on

[renegade74]

hi, I've just fitted a new ceiling light in my kitchen but the light stays on no matter what way i flick the switch. I've connectted red to brown, earth to earth. One black neutrel to the 2 blues & the other black neutrel next to it, although i'm wasn't sure if this was correct to i twisted them both together & linked them to both blues this blew the bulb & the main fuse. What could I be doing wrong?

Thanks for any help

 

[Har_vey]

You do get yourself in some situations with these new light fittings renegade! Why don't you draw yourself a picture before you take the old fitting apart?

 

[renegade74]

yeah just my luck for it not to work again. The old fitting was plastic without any labeling so i dont think it would've helped me anyway

 

[Spark123]

A common mistake to make is to connect the switch directly across the supply.
Switch off the supply and check it is off!!!
Firstly you need a multimeter set to ohms range. Disconnect the two cables and put connect the multimeter across one cables red & black wires. Get someone to operate the switch. You should see the reading on the multimeter go from high reading to low. If not, try the other cable. Once you have found the switch wire, put a piece of red sleeve over the black wire as this is switched live. The switched live connects to the L terminal (with brown wires), the black wire connects to the N terminal (with the blue wires) and the two red wires connect together in a spare block. Both the earths connect to the earth terminal.

 

[renegade74]

so one of the black wires is live & goes into the block oposite the brown?
I dont have a multimeter so what would happen if i wired them up wrong would it just not work or somethin worse?
The two twisted reds go into a spare block?

 

[plugwash]

yep the two twisted wires are the permanent live and go into a spare block.

the fitting will work whichever way round you connect the two blacks but ideally you should try to get it right especially if the fitting is edison screw.

if your light is stuck on at the moment then the black wire you have connected to the light must be the neutral and the other one the switched live.

 

[Spark123]

Can you borrow a multimeter, get one from B&Q etc?
I always like to be able to distinguish phase/neutral wires and is important when installing ES type fittings.

 

[renegade74]

got it working now, thanks for the help again. It seems my logic of connecting the red live wire to the brown live wire was a little flawed!