Installing a ceiling light fitting, Help! Stumped by wires!

[freescot]

There are two wires that come from the ceiling, one copperish in colour and one grey, inside the grey one is a red and black wire. The copper wire is just a wire. these 3 wires went into the old rose, to which we attached the blub. I think I need to figure out which is live , earth and neutral. On the new light fitting there are 3 wires, standard. l.n.e. It's a case of what to attach to what. black n red appear to be live!

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Hello, i'm installing a new ceiling light fitting and from the ceiling there are three wires, two red and one black!

How was the old light connected? Where did you put the diagram you drew?

And no earth? Hope the new light doesn't need one, and that you don't have any metal light switches.

Of the two red wires, one is thicker( I don't know if that makes a difference) and it make be live, the thinner red wire is definitely live . The black wire is also live.

1) Well obviously they can't all be live, or the old light would never have worked.

2) 3 is a strange number to have - it's either too many of too few. What's at the switch?

3) Are you using a multimeter to establish which ones are live, or one of those useless neon screwdrivers?

On the light fitting itself there is only two connection ports, so I tried the thin red and the black (which are the same thickness) whilst isolating the thick red wire and nothing. I then tried connecting the two red wires into one port and the black in the other and that tripped the fuse!

Then one of those reds must be a neutral. Did it trip with the light switch off or on?

 

[freescot]

ok scrape everything i've said. There are two wires that come from the ceiling, one copperish in colour and one grey, inside the grey one is a red and black wire. The copper wire is just a wire. these 3 wires went into the old rose, to which we attached the blub. I think I need to figure out which is live , earth and neutral. On the new light fitting there are 3 wires, standard. l.n.e. It's a case of what to attach to what. black n red appear to be live!!

 

[comms]

Red connect to L terminal of light.
Black connect to N terminal of light.
Bare copper needs sheathing with green/yellow sleeving & connecting to the E terminal of light fitting.

 

[freescot]

the copper wire is not bare copper, it is copper coloured! do you mean that inside the copper coloured wire there will be two differing coloured wires?

 

[freescot]

Sorry , i get it, your saying that is green n yellow.

 

[securespark]

You need to post some pics!!

 

[ban-all-sheds]

ok scrape everything i've said. There are two wires that come from the ceiling, one copperish in colour and one grey, inside the grey one is a red and black wire. The copper wire is just a wire.

Hopefully the odd one is an earth, but it's worrying that it's not sleeved G/Y. Are you sure it doesn't originate in the cable? Is the sheath of that cut off neatly, or split?

these 3 wires went into the old rose, to which we attached the blub. I think I need to figure out which is live , earth and neutral.

Red, bare & black would be the conventional choices.

What did you do with the drawing you made of which wires went where in the rose?

On the new light fitting there are 3 wires, standard. l.n.e. It's a case of what to attach to what. black n red appear to be live!!

Well they can't be.

"Appear live" with respect to what? What are you using to test them?

 

[freescot]

having problem at moment uploading pics, will do tomorrow, thanks for help so far

 

[Taylortwocities]

Agree, dont assume anything. Lets wait for the pics. It sounds like old transparent pvc over copper wire. Usually stranded.

You could get this sort of stuff at Woolies etc in the 50's and 60's and it was used a lot to connect up batteries and 6v lamps. Also handy as aerial for your crystal set.
I've seen this stuff used wrongly for all sorts of things.....

 

[freescot]

here are two pics, one of wires coming from ceiling and the other of the light fitting:



as said, there is one grey wire with red/black wires within it and one wire with a copper coloured sheath. They are supposed to fit to the 3 wires on the fitting, all standard colour coded. However the red n black wires appear to be live.



I added boxes to wires

 

[securespark]

That twin looks like pvc, the single is rubber.

The rubber could be a disused switchwire or live feed.

Is there a cpc (bare copper earth wire) within that twin cable?

Without it, you cannot fit a Class I fitting (Class I = requiring an earth connection).

 

[holmslaw]

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[Spark123]

Looks like a single VIR to me

 

[holmslaw]

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