Loft flooring over lights

[Paul6756]

I have recently installed spotlights in my landing ceiling and want to cover part of the loft over the lights.

The lights give out quite a bit of heat. I have cut away to 100mm the loft insulation around the lights and want to cover over the lights with loft flooring. If I drill a number of holes into the panels covering the lights will this be enough to dissipate the heat from the lights. (The ends are sitting about 1" under the flooring).

Thanks

 

[Reynardine]

There are special fire hoods that you can buy that will fit between your joists and over your downlighters. Try googling for "rated fire hoods".

Alternatively , you can go somewhere like homebase/B&Q and buy a ceramic flowerpot or a cheap vase (a vase is the same as a flowerpot but has no drainage holes ), invert this and place over your downlighter.

 

[chappers]

Just do as you have and leave some space around the lights don't worry about the flooring after all you don't worry about about it when they are on the ground floor.
Fire hoods are to prevent the spread of fire from one floor to the next not to stop the lights setting anything on fire.

 

[Symptoms]

Paul - board over the lamps then with a hole saw, fixed in your electric drill, drill a vent hole directly above each lamp. These holes could be maybe 50mm dia or bigger (bigger is sometimes helpful for maintenance access, say to transformers, if 'from below' access is limited due to lamp design or the chance of spoiling decoration if the lamp needs to be pulled out). If you ain't got a hole saw at the moment buy a cheapo set from one of the sheds. Take care when drilling so as not to damage the lamp , maybe setting the holesaw pilot drill so it doesn't stick-out too far.

 

[GaryMo]

Have a look at any information on the fitting, hopefully yours will display the top symbol which means it'll be suitable for direct mounting on normally flammable surfaces (should have an aluminium reflector lamp to direct heat away from the luminaire).

Installing downlighers safely