One switch lighting to 2 switch lighting

[mightynimrod]

Hi all, i've got a single switch light in my garage and i want to add an outside light by tapping in to this and putting a double switch on it to control the outside light.

The single switch has 2 red wires going into it 1 to the common and one to the L1.

the double switch that i'm using has common L1 and L2 terminals on each of the switches.

What cable should i use and how should i wire it up so both lights work independantly of each other.

BTW i plan to wire the outside light to a P.I.R as well.

Any advice is appreciated.

Many thanks

 

[breezer]

sorry to say but you can not do exactly as you plan.

you will need to take a feed from your existing light , but it may be easier if you have a consumers unit on the garage.

tell me have you a consumers unit in the garage?

if not take the existing light apart and tell me what colours and how may cables there are (it will be easier for me to tell you how to do it this way)

and it goes without saying turn all the mains off first

 

[mightynimrod]

Bummer!

All that is in the garage is a light connected to a switch which as i said has 2 red wires into the switch, one going to Common, the other to L! and the Earth just terminated behind the switch.

I can't get to the light fitting at the moment, i can tell you that there is no consumer unit in the garage though.

It's in the Kitchen

 

[breezer]

that is helpful. so its just the one light, any sockets?

in the light you should find a red & black (same cable) and two reds (same cable but going to the switch)

you connect a 1.5 mm twin and earth colour to colour to the cable which is NOT going to the switch.

You now have 2 options

1) you can take this new cable direct to the switch and connect another cable from the switch to the light. how ever if you do this you must connect the black wires to each other via a choc bloc and one red goes in C and the other in L1

2) take the new cable from the existing light direct to the the new external light, and another cable from the external light to the switch and connect the red to C and the black to L1 but you should put red tape on the black in the switch to indicate it is live.

in either case you must put green/yellow sleaving on the bare copper earth wires so that all earth wires are connected

there are a couple of other ways you can do it but those two are the easiest.

I would suggest you do option 1 as trying to get 2 cables in an external light may not be that easy