Using American 16 AWG wire for UK lighting?
- Thread starter Rsian
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Probably wanted good quality cable, instead of the East European crap.
Only problem is... American electrical standards aren't as strict as ours, so in many respects its hard to say if it is actually better quality or not.
A few reasons why I say that,
No earth on most appliances.. With the exception of 1 or 2.
All connections by their rules should be terminated in a metal junction box, but due to lack of earth, metal junction box is not earthed and can become live in a fault situation, certainly on American tv shows I've also not witnessed those junction boxes having covers... It's just a metal box with the connection inside it made with ceramic twist connectors.
Same goes for their equivalent to a consumer unit.. Metal and most likely unearthed due to lack of earth in their wiring systems.
Those are just observations I've seen, might be wrong as I don't live in America.
But lots of things in America are below our standards and sometimes in fact actually behind.. Like broadband here the government has been pushing for faster speeds and currently VDSL pumps out 80mbit down, but in America they aren't widely doing speeds anywhere near that.
Never heard or seen anything like an MOT equivalent out there... Sometimes makes me laugh because you see these car shows on tv from America, they just build a car, no idea if its safe or not and take it out on the road.. Here you would be tied up in all sorts of red tape and sva tests
Some aspects though like draft proofing they was ahead of us for a while, their standards required plastic sheeting all the walls before insralling plasterboard (vapour barrier as they call it) and might still be, but we have caught up on insulation in recent years.
A few reasons why I say that,
No earth on most appliances.. With the exception of 1 or 2.
All connections by their rules should be terminated in a metal junction box, but due to lack of earth, metal junction box is not earthed and can become live in a fault situation, certainly on American tv shows I've also not witnessed those junction boxes having covers... It's just a metal box with the connection inside it made with ceramic twist connectors.
Same goes for their equivalent to a consumer unit.. Metal and most likely unearthed due to lack of earth in their wiring systems.
Those are just observations I've seen, might be wrong as I don't live in America.
But lots of things in America are below our standards and sometimes in fact actually behind.. Like broadband here the government has been pushing for faster speeds and currently VDSL pumps out 80mbit down, but in America they aren't widely doing speeds anywhere near that.
Never heard or seen anything like an MOT equivalent out there... Sometimes makes me laugh because you see these car shows on tv from America, they just build a car, no idea if its safe or not and take it out on the road.. Here you would be tied up in all sorts of red tape and sva tests
Some aspects though like draft proofing they was ahead of us for a while, their standards required plastic sheeting all the walls before insralling plasterboard (vapour barrier as they call it) and might still be, but we have caught up on insulation in recent years.
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ok, all I want to do is replace the very basic wiring in a wall light so as to be safe in the UK.
I bought the wire in the US as I was going to just replace the existing stuff with some rated for the UK - I was there, I bought it. Apologies for not realising that one of the worlds most health and safety concious nations does not have a policy as robust as ours in the UK (you won't like the American wire connectors I bought either then I guess (a paxk of 'push in', and a pack of 'twist'.
I am more than happy to purchase the correct wire in the UK.
The t&e suggested a couple of posts up is the type I have in the wall, this is too rigid, can I use flexible t&e, and if so will 1mm suffice?
If I don't use the connectors in the US, what connector type would you recommend to connect the wall wiring to thelight wiring, bearing in mind the connector has to fit inside the wall light (there is some room, not masses)?
Thanks.
I bought the wire in the US as I was going to just replace the existing stuff with some rated for the UK - I was there, I bought it. Apologies for not realising that one of the worlds most health and safety concious nations does not have a policy as robust as ours in the UK (you won't like the American wire connectors I bought either then I guess (a paxk of 'push in', and a pack of 'twist'.
I am more than happy to purchase the correct wire in the UK.
The t&e suggested a couple of posts up is the type I have in the wall, this is too rigid, can I use flexible t&e, and if so will 1mm suffice?
If I don't use the connectors in the US, what connector type would you recommend to connect the wall wiring to thelight wiring, bearing in mind the connector has to fit inside the wall light (there is some room, not masses)?
Thanks.
I wouldn't call America the most health and safety concious, when it comes to that this country has them beat and probably most countries.
If America doesn't even have anything similar to an sva, or mot then they can't be that worried about safety lol.
But the cable is dangerous here, for if no other reason the fact that their live is black and our neutral used to be black also, and if its a metal light fitting as well, the cable won't have an earth? So how would you earth the light fitting? If a fault occurred the fitting could potentially end up live.
For an unsuspecting DIYer in future it could mean getting those wires mixed up and confused... And crossing neutral and live can result in serious injury, loss of life or destruction of property... It's serious.
Which is why when we changed colours an approved label was also created to warn future people that 2 versions of wiring existed
If America doesn't even have anything similar to an sva, or mot then they can't be that worried about safety lol.
But the cable is dangerous here, for if no other reason the fact that their live is black and our neutral used to be black also, and if its a metal light fitting as well, the cable won't have an earth? So how would you earth the light fitting? If a fault occurred the fitting could potentially end up live.
For an unsuspecting DIYer in future it could mean getting those wires mixed up and confused... And crossing neutral and live can result in serious injury, loss of life or destruction of property... It's serious.
Which is why when we changed colours an approved label was also created to warn future people that 2 versions of wiring existed
I was replacing like for like and had purchased individual red and black wires to replace the individual wiring in the light. I was also going to use a seperate individual earth wire.
If anyone can recommend what I need from my previous post I would be most grteful.
If anyone can recommend what I need from my previous post I would be most grteful.
What you need is to dump all that useless gear you've bought from America, and go out and buy the proper approved UK versions, and put it down to experience so you won't make the same mistake again.
I know it's not what you want to hear and more than likely you'll just ignore this advice but it is the only sensible thing to do.
I know it's not what you want to hear and more than likely you'll just ignore this advice but it is the only sensible thing to do.
I said two posts up I am happy to re-buy everything here, but the American thing seems to have got in the way of this getting answered.
To re-iterrate:
2 x 250v 25w lamps in parallel
Breaker is 6 amps
Can I use 1mm 3 core cable for the internal wiring?
What is the best connector type to connect t&e to the light cable (this connector needs to be as small as possible.
For wall lights you would generally use 1.0 mm2 or 1.5 mm2 twin and earth flat cable. Don't use round flex, it's just not generally used on fixed wiring.
Use green and yellow sleeving over the bare earth wire.
5 or 6 amp connector blocks are typically used to connect between the wall light and the wiring emerging from the wall.
Use green and yellow sleeving over the bare earth wire.
5 or 6 amp connector blocks are typically used to connect between the wall light and the wiring emerging from the wall.
T and E is not really suitable to internally rewire a wallight
Most uk pendants on 6a circuits i find rarely have larger than 1mm flex.
Personally i would buy a metre of 1mm heat resistant pvc cable strip it and use the coloured cores
buy uk bc brass lampholders with earth tags, and if needbe the relevant thread adaptors.
Either run all 3 cores through to the holder or alternatively 2 cores and terminate the earth at the base, if its a threaded base use an earth tag washer.
Use 5 amp connectors behind the base and if needbe chop the wall out slightly to accomadate
Whoops.
I now see what you mean.
Yes, you would use flex for the INTERNAL wiring of the wall light itself.
Are you sure that you're interpreting 'internal wiring' correctly? I thought it referred to wiring within the light fitting (not 'fixed wiring') - in which case flex would be appropriate.
Kind Regards, John
Yes, I noticed that mistake. See above.
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