HELP!!! Halogen bulbs keep tripping fuse box

[satell1te]

I hope someone can help me as this is so frustrating!
I have recently bought a house - everything was fine and absolutely no problem for a few weeks and then all of a sudden I find that every time I switch the row of 10 halogen lights on in the dining room I see a flash coming from a hole where a bulb is missing and the fuse box trips. I tried replacing the bulb, changing the switch, checking the connections but still it keeps happening.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Stop turning them on.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

OK - seriously....

Was the lamp always missing? I wonder why?

You said you could see a flash, which means some kind of fault, also indicated by it tripping the... what? Is it the MCB for the circuit which trips, or an RCD?

When you said you checked the connections, what did that entail?

 

[Porque223]

a flash coming from a hole where a bulb is missing and the fuse box trips.

That is where your short circuit is located?

 

[satell1te]

The bulb that is now missing originally worked fine but then tripped the Main fuse board fuse for that lighting circuit in the house. I left the bulb in and re-set the tripped fuse and it was fine for a couple more weeks but then the tripping started whenever I turned the light on. There is actually a flash that comes from the hole where the bulb was then the main fuse board trips the trip switch to that circuit!

 

[satell1te]

The flash comes from the hole where the bulb was (and flashed when the bulb was in too!) so I took out the bulb. There is a little white connection box into which the wires from the bulb holder were... I have removed the wires to the bulb holder so that the original circuit (which worked fine before) was "inactive".
The strange thing is that nothing has changed or been tampered with/altered etc so although I realise there must be a short somewhere, I cannot for the life of me think where it is or how it happened. Apparently that circuit and the lights were fitting about 5 years ago by an electrician...

 

[Taylortwocities]

The connections behind those halogen lamps get very hot.
The connections are very cheaply made to drive down price.
After a time they fail, causing bad connections, melting and short circuits.

Change to wiring and/or connector and it should be OK.

Better still, rip those dumb torchlights out of the ceiling and install something that is designed to illuminate a room.