kitchen light help please.

Hello all,

got an issue with lighting in the house, basically the kitchen light wont switch on by itself, the only way to get it on is to switch on the living room light and then it comes on ? any ideas what is going on its like the living room light switch controls the kitchen light.

any ideas please.

thanks.

 

It would seem to be wrongly wired, probably at the living room ceiling rose.

Has it always been like this or has some work been done to cause it?

 

her ex put new lights up years ago and its been like this ever since, ive put a new one up in living room and it was wired right ie neutral live earth etc i presume both earths of the light and wiring from the ceiling go together any solutions would be great.

thanks.

 

In this diagram -



you will see the red wire of the 'supply to the next light' is connected to the other reds 'supply' and 'to switch'.
You may have a ceiling rose instead of the connector block in the diagram but the connections will be the same.

Yours would seem to be connected with the 'black wire with red sleeve' (switched live from switch).
There may be other wires as well as the ones in the diagram depending on your set up.

If it is not apparent when you look at it you will need at least a multi-meter to determine which wire is what.

Don't forget to turn of the power.

 

Is this a two way light (ie did it originally with on and off from both switches) or just one way?
If you could upload pictures or give more detail of the cables and terminals within the switch plates and light fitting it could help.
Do isolate circuit prior to removing covers.

 

checked the switches.

the kitchen one has 3 points with red wire at top, earth to casing and a red wire in point L1 says on the case for one way use L2 now i moved the red wire from L1 to L2 and its still the same situation.

the living room has 2 light switches that control the living room light 1 of them has 3 points top one has a red wire going to common ? which am sure isnt correct as doesnt yellow go to common, and bottom 2 have a blue wire and a yellow wire with earth to the casing. this is a one way switch.

thats all the info i can give u at this point i will take a pic of the ceiling rose and wiring asap but am sure if it was wired wrong it wouldnt work ?

thanks so far.

 

So lets clarify:
The living room was a two way function (two switches operating the same light)?
and the kitchen light is on a one way single gang switch and only works when the living room light is on?
So kitchen light and living room light are not on the same switch plate (double gang switch)?
If that is true the connection that is incorrect sounds like it will be at the living room light fitting, providing no junction boxes in the ceiling void.
The loop between living room light and kitchen light has been cross connected and only when the the living room light is on, is live being supplied to the kitchen part of the circuit.

So your living room light fitting (ceiling rose) will have an incoming live, neutral and earth then an outgoing live, neutral and earth which feeds the kitchen light. This is the loop and all the lives should be connected together forming a live loop (but not at the live side of the fitting) separate of everything else, if a ceiling rose this will be the central terminals on the rose, if not then a connection block and the neutrals should be terminated at the neutral side of the fitting.
Then a live feed to living room switch and a switch live that returns to the live side of the fitting. The live feed to the switch should be terminated in the live loop (so three cables in there) and all earths together in earth terminal.
I would expect the live loop and switch cables to be red and neutrals to be black.
Now what you need to do is identify the loop in lives and the switch cables.
As it seems they have been mixed up, as I suspect the outgoing live to the kitchen is terminated at the live side of the living room light and not in the live loop. Therefore when the switch for living room light is on, the kitchen light will function but when off will not.

 

yes thats right,

the living room light is controlled by 2 light switches and the kitchen light only works if you switch the living room light on ie its providing power to the kitchen light.

as far as i know from memory as i havent checked again yet, the wires from the ceiling are 1 earth 1 black and 1 brown and also the light itself has an earth as well.

and i connected it using a connector box those clear plastic ones.

 

If that's correct, there must be either a junction box in ceiling void or there could be cables that will pull through the hole in ceiling where the connection strip at the light is.

 

If you need to find a tradesperson to get your job done, please try our local search below, or if you are doing it yourself you can find suppliers local to you.

Select the supplier or trade you require, enter your location to begin your search.

Please select a service and enter a location to continue...

Plumber / Gas Engineer Electrician Builder Decorator Builders' Merchant Plumbers' Merchant Tile Supplier Flooring Supplier
Start Search

Are you a trade or supplier? You can create your listing free at DIYnot Local