Thought i was clever :(

[wayne11]

You beat me to it

 

[ColJack]

ok, so this is getting even more weird...

if these are the 2 kitchen lights ( as your first post says they are ) then you've managed to somehow wire one of them in series with the laounge lights..

we now need pictures of the connections in the lights.... ( kitchen and lounge, and for good measure, one of the conservatory lights too )

from the picture you appear to have your wires crossed at the switch too.

the reds and blacks don't go to the same switches..

swap the 2 reds and see if that helps first..

 

[wayne11]

That will have to be in the morning Coljack, already in bad books with the better half, dont think she would appreciate me pulling lights down tonight

Do you mean the the last picture that ive wired in? ive never touched the 4gang until today, i can only assume it was done when the kitchen was fitted, although i have just been told the 4gang used to be on the other side of the door frame and was moved to its current position to make way for units, could this have something to do with the "funny" wiring?
cheers mate

Wayne

 

[wayne11]

from the picture you appear to have your wires crossed at the switch too.

the reds and blacks don't go to the same switches..

Dont think they do mate

 

[ColJack]

if it's been "moved" ( the kitchen one I assume ) then there's a good chance there's a junction box being used somewhere, either under a floor, on top of a cabinet or if they were feeding a horse at lunch times, then it may still be behind a cabinet..

oh and I'm house sitting tomorrow so don't expect a reply ( from me anyway ) untill about 16:00- 17:00.. ish..

 

[ericmark]

I would have expected to find the two wires in one cable would go to same switch.

However in that diagram you show the two wires from single cable going to different switches.

Of course we don't know what is other end of cables but I would consider swapping the two reds around so the two wires from a single cable go to same switch.

 

[wayne11]

I tried this already but to be sure i have just put the red and black on the same switch again, both lights do not work, can anbody tell me how to wire the 4gang into the new 3gang by looking at the pictures provided?, if not the old 4gang is going back up sideways
cheers

*UPDATE* i have wired the 4gang back in and can also confirm the wiring in the diagram is correct

 

[Space cat]

The key to this whole conundrum is in that drawing of the original switches, which you say is correct. For the lights to work as you describe, what you must have had in there was a single live feed coming in through the middle cable - the one you've labelled Conservatory - to L1 on the switch you call four. Short wires then carry this feed onto the other three switches. These links are conspicuous by their absence in your new switches so that's not a good start!

Your labelling of the other cables is wrong. The leftmost cable carries switched live to BOTH kitchen lights, one core for each. The rightmost cable goes to your switch four and would appear to be part of some long-forgotten two-way switching circuit. I suggest that when you wired the new switches, you got your wires mixed up such that the live feed for your kitchen lights is now coming through that old cable.

One thing is clear: you have not transferred the wires correctly to your new switches. Maybe the conservatory switch is correct but the two light switches are not. They are taking their live feeds from highly dubious sources. To make this work, you will need to add the link wires that were present in the old switch.

As for that rightmost cable, start by isolating its ends in choc-block. You may or may not need it to make your lounge lights work but lets solve the kitchen light problem first.

 

[Space cat]

I've just spotted your latest post so here goes:

The red core in the cable you've marked Conservatory is the only reliable live feed you've got. It was the one that fed all the lights in the old switches but it's now only feeding the conservatory light switch. That's why that one works. In the new switch, this wire must be linked to all three COMs.

The black core in the Conservatory cable is switched live to that light. Put it into L1 on whichever switch you want to use for the purpose. If the switch works upside down, move it to L2 instead.

Of the remaining two cables, only one is needed for the lights. This is the one that was leftmost on your old switch diagram. Connect the cores to the L1 terminals on the other two switches. If the allocation of lights to switches is not to your liking swap these two cores over and, as before, if a switch works upside down use L2 instead.

You should now have three working lights which do not depend upon any other switches. Isolate the cores of the third cable in choc-block (except for the earth) then make sure your living room lights still work.

Edit: I've just spotted this:

until i turn the living room lights on...these wont come on until the kitchen lights are turned off and visa versa

If this is correct, at least one of the cores in that third cable is needed to make the living room lights work. Either the black one must be connected to the linked COMs in the new switch or else they must be connected together. What you have in there is, to put it mildly, a mess.

 

[wayne11]

Thanks spacecat, that is an easy enough read for me mate, thankyou, as i am typing this i have just finished replacing the old 4gang, everything is back to normal except the switch is now side ways on, wife doesnt mind but its driving me nuts just looking at it, thats why i asked in a previous post if people thought that the conservatory wire had another use, question is do i now take it all back off again or just leave it as it is?, i can read your solution perfectly clear which is giving me a kick to take it off again i will let you know the outcome which will be towards the weekend now...and thanks again to you and all the other replys

Wayne

 

[ColJack]

the cable marked "kitchen light 2" is the problem then..

the very left hand switch did nothing you say, so by that configuration.. the red would be a live, and the black a switched live.. meaning that no matter which way the switch was, the black wire always had power..

the problem is that as the 2G switch is wired this then goes through the kitchen light before going to the lounge light.. meaning the lounge light is getting only around half the voltage..

big question... is the lounge light fitted with energy saving bulbs?

this is why they didn't seem to work with the wires uncrossed.. no kitchen lights because the one switch had no power, and the other isn't connected to the kitchen..

try just connecting the red from one cable to the black from the same cable in a connector block ( for both cables ) and see if the lounge lights work.

View media item 10992
try that.. should work...

 

[wayne11]

Lounge ceiling light has 3 energy savers in, kitchen are both energy savers.

 

[securespark]

Going back to that picture of the 4G switch wired up, is there any way to identify which cables the wires in the same terminal came from?

 

[wayne11]

I take it back...you Are that good , rigged up the 3 gang as per diagram but as space cat pointed out it was the left most cable that was needed "kitchen 2" not the right as per diagram, might be good ColJack if this could be swapped round for future reference just incase there are more muppets with shot wiring in need of it although that diagram made it all the more easier. either way a big thanks to all who replyed, i now have working kitchen and conservatory lights with an added bonus of working lounge lights too....What can i say but thanks again

Wayne

 

[Space cat]

it was the left most cable that was needed "kitchen 2" not the right as per diagram

Actually, your leftmost cable is marked "kitchen 1" and ColJack's drawing is correct.

PS: If that was in my house, I wouldn't be happy until I knew where all those extra wires went. I've tried lots of ways to explain this:

until i turn the living room lights on...these wont come on until the kitchen lights are turned off and visa versa

but nothing makes sense. When you first wired it up, you had two lights trying to take live feed from the cores of the mysterious "kitchen 2" cable. You say that the lights in question are low-energy types. Did they come on at full brightness or were they a bit dim, which would suggest you have resistance lurking in series - like a filament bulb somewhere else?