Wiring Downlights

[BackyardDIY]

You mention joist in the singular, you will have multiple joists up there.

At a rough guesstimate, you're likely to have somewhere between 6-8 joists to contend with (depending on the direction they run) from one wall to the other. This means that somewhere around 4 of these are going to be in your way. Not to mention noggins

By "the joist" I meant the one that the old fitting was attached to. I doubt there are any more though tbh. The first room is a tiny cloakroom, barely 2m². The second isn't much bigger. Definitely not 6-8 joists to contend with! That said, I can identify any obstructions in as messy fashion as I like as I don't need to worry about the existing ceiling.

One light either side of that joist would be sufficient, I'm only considering 4 purely for asthetics.

 

[Taylortwocities]

Ceiling joists will typically be 400mm apart.

 

[ericmark]

I personally would not fit small spot lights directly into the ceiling. Not against the small spot lamp I have a light bar myself in the bedroom with two spots aimed at dark corners, the point is they are aimed at where the light is required not just shining down.

Size matters, put a 10W 12 inch surface lamp on the ceiling and you get a good spread of light, reduce it to 2 inches and the light is rather too concentrated, use LED lamps with vents so light reduced to 1 inch and only way they work is if pointed at a special area or reflected off some white surface. As you say very small room so using maybe 4 x 2W LED's you have got 8 inches so not so bad, but fitting a 12 inch surface lamp would be so much easier.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

P.S. I'm supprised BAS hasn't jump't in with the swiss cheese ceiling………

The OP hadn't said that he is going to cut lots of holes in his ceilings.

building regs……… heat loss…….. fire……..

Please show what I have said about those things in the past.

Actually said, I mean, not inventions that you have come up with because you are so hard of thinking.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

One light either side of that joist would be sufficient,

So you are changing the lights, and with the new ones you have chosen you'll need twice as many as you had before.

Does that not tell you that the new type aren't really any good for the job you want them to do, i.e. lighting up the room?

I'm only considering 4 purely for asthetics.

So now you've ended up with 4 x as many lights as you had before, and twice as many as you actually need, even given how useless they are.

And you think that looks good?

 

[BackyardDIY]

One light either side of that joist would be sufficient,

So you are changing the lights, and with the new ones you have chosen you'll need twice as many as you had before.

Does that not tell you that the new type aren't really any good for the job you want them to do, i.e. lighting up the room?

I'm only considering 4 purely for asthetics.

So now you've ended up with 4 x as many lights as you had before, and twice as many as you actually need, even given how useless they are.

And you think that looks good?

When I say I'm considering 4 lights purely for asthetics I'm not referring to the lighting given off but how the lights themselves will look fitted into the ceiling. Just comes down to personal choice really. 4 lights may look better than 2, but I think I will test this theory out with some templates stuck to the ceiling!

As for the lighting given off, I'm aiming for a maximum of around 400lm. For 4 lights this would mean 100lm from each bulb which is probably not that practical, so this too will inform my decision.

 

[Iggifer]

The 5w Enlite GU10 LEDs we fit as standard are 500lm.

Whilst I'm sure there's plenty of lamps in the 100lm range, you may as well go brighter