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Tuffers

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I have an outside light by the front door, a lantern type light. I have bought an up/down light like this

View attachment 5663

The problem I have is that there are only 2 wires coming out of the wall, live and neutral. In the instructions with the new light it says that this light has to be earthed. How do I earth it?

 
I have an outside light by the front door, a lantern type light. I have bought an up/down light like this
View attachment 8227

The problem I have is that there are only 2 wires coming out of the wall, live and neutral. In the instructions with the new light it says that this light has to be earthed. How do I earth it?

All lighting circuits have to be earthed according to current regulations.

This is all about Part P which states that all electrical work needs to be done by a qualified electrician and certified that the work done meets the current regulations.

Where do the wires through the wall come from? If it is an on/off light switch, then unscrew the switch fascia after switching the power to the house off. The switch fascia will be secured to either a plastic or a metal box. There should be an earth wire screwed into a corner connector on this, or it maybe into the wire connector itself. It will be easily recognized by its colour of green and yellow and/or the earth symbol. (Most earth cables are bare copper wire with a shrink sleeve on the end in green and yellow.)

If there is something like that, then you need to add an earth wire from that connector through the wall and fix it to any part of the metal housing of the light body. It should have its own earth connector.

http://www.screwfix.com/p/lap-installation-boxes-galvanised-steel-2-gang-35mm-pack-of-10/88287

If you look carefully at this galvanized back box you will see the earth connector in the left hand bottom corner.

The problem is if this switch box does not have an earth provision. (Our house was build in 1965 and it was built to the electrical regulations of the day. The plug sockets had to be earthed but the light circuits didn't. When we bought the house 15 years ago, we couldn't get a mortgage on the property until all the light circuits were upgraded. The house next door has just been sold and this is also one of the conditions of their mortgage.) We had a problem with the hall way light as there was no way we could run an earth cable to that. So the electrician ran an earth cable from the light to the nearest plug socket. I had to chisel a groove out in the wall plaster to bury the wire in. We had to follow the horizontal/vertical protocol when doing this.

If you have a light screwed into the ceiling and is metal

http://www.screwfix.com/p/shot-3-light-spotlight-brushed-polished-chrome/98834

then this has to be earthed.

if you have this

http://www.screwfix.com/p/british-general-6-pendant-set-white/22210

then the bulb holder doesn't have to be earthed. There will only be 2 cables in the cable itself - brown for live and blue for neutral. However, there will be/or should be an earth wire in the ceiling should the lights be changed for a metal one.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Cheers @spruce. This what I have, a 2 gang light switch in the entrance hall. One switch turns on the hall light and the one next to it (on the same socket) turns on the outside light. The cables running to the outside light are threaded through a brick wall. Even if there is an earth wire on the socket in the entrance hall I'm going to struggle to get an earth through the brickwork to the outside light. I think I'll have to get a sparky in :thumbsdown:

 
Cheers @spruce. This what I have, a 2 gang light switch in the entrance hall. One switch turns on the hall light and the one next to it (on the same socket) turns on the outside light. The cables running to the outside light are threaded through a brick wall. Even if there is an earth wire on the socket in the entrance hall I'm going to struggle to get an earth through the brickwork to the outside light. I think I'll have to get a sparky in :thumbsdown:
Our back door had the same issue. I removed the back box out of the wall. It is usually held in place by a screw and wall plug. I drilled a bigger hole and feed some 3 core lighting cable through. It wasn't difficult to do.

There where a couple of outside lights in the garden that really fell fowl of the electrical regulations. We disconnected all the wiring and removed it completely. That satisfied that section. Replacing the cable with armour cable through it own circuit was going to cost the earth /emoticons/smile.png to upgrade it.

 
Cheers @spruce. This what I have, a 2 gang light switch in the entrance hall. One switch turns on the hall light and the one next to it (on the same socket) turns on the outside light. The cables running to the outside light are threaded through a brick wall. Even if there is an earth wire on the socket in the entrance hall I'm going to struggle to get an earth through the brickwork to the outside light. I think I'll have to get a sparky in :thumbsdown:
Our back door had the same issue. I removed the back box out of the wall. It is usually held in place by a screw and wall plug. I drilled a bigger hole and feed some 3 core lighting cable through. It wasn't difficult to do.

There where a couple of outside lights in the garden that really fell fowl of the electrical regulations. We disconnected all the wiring and removed it completely. That satisfied that section. Replacing the cable with armour cable through it own circuit was going to cost the earth /emoticons/smile.png to upgrade it.

 
Cheers @spruce. This what I have, a 2 gang light switch in the entrance hall. One switch turns on the hall light and the one next to it (on the same socket) turns on the outside light. The cables running to the outside light are threaded through a brick wall. Even if there is an earth wire on the socket in the entrance hall I'm going to struggle to get an earth through the brickwork to the outside light. I think I'll have to get a sparky in :thumbsdown:
Our back door had the same issue. I removed the back box out of the wall. It is usually held in place by a screw and wall plug. I drilled a bigger hole and feed some 3 core lighting cable through. It wasn't difficult to do.

There where a couple of outside lights in the garden that really fell fowl of the electrical regulations. We disconnected all the wiring and removed it completely. That satisfied that section. Replacing the cable with armour cable through it own circuit was going to cost the earth /emoticons/smile.png to upgrade it.

 
You did it 3 times ??
Sorry. If I could delete the last 2 posts I would.

Our internet went very slow last night and eventually died. It appeared to me that the time that had elapsed between posting and the file updated was so long that the system had timed out.

My mistake as it hadn't./emoticons/sad.png

 
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