Trying to replace the downlights in my kitchen - what am I doing wrong?

[feckityfeck]

I've bought these to replace our halogen lights which have always been temperamental.

I've just connected everything up I can, and it won't work. I've tried a different bulb but it didn't make any difference.

I haven't done this kind of thing before, so it's possible I'm missing something obvious. The only thing which doesn't seem right is that the old lights were connected with a live wire and a neutral wire only, but the new ones have an earth socket too, which I don't have anything to connect to it. Is that the problem?

Starting to think I need to send them back and get some double insulated lights so I don't need an earth.

I've investigated further back in the wiring and I can pull out two junction boxes. The one closest to the light fitting has one white cable going in and the two wires coming out (live and neutral). The one further back has a grey cable going in, which I can see splits into live, neutral and earth in the box, and only the live and neutral have wires connected which go into the white cable coming out.

I have no idea whether any of this is relevant, or whether the light should work even without the earth, and in fact I've wired it up wrong or the lights are faulty.

So, after more investigating, I've worked out the black box is a junction box, and the white box is a transformer, on of these. So, if the new lights have 'No Transformer required' on the box, does that mean I can remove that and buy new cable with live, neutral and earth wires to go straight from the junction box to the lights?

I am aware that I'm talking to myself here, just hoping someone checks out the property section and knows what I'm talking about!

I think you probably can...I know I was told our old halogen fittings (with transformers) wouldn't work with LEDs.

But after 3 of them stopped working completely I just had the lot replaced with new LED fittings (I do not dare mess with wires )

(I had 6 halogen fittings which needed 50w bulbs - I now have 9 LEDs, 5w each I think, & the light is really nice!)

So, if I removed everything from the junction box onwards, and used this to wire from the junction box to the light fitting, would that work? The cables come in different diameters, I'd guess an individual light fitting doesn't need big cables?

Message from my DH, who knows about this kind of thing.

"First off be very careful, many lighting systems have what is called a permanent live in the junction box in the ceiling. Just because the light switch is off does not mean the circuit is dead. It is important to switch off at the fuse box.

You are correct you have 240v fittings, therefore the white transformer is not required. You just need to connect the new fitting to where the transformer is wired to. The cable you have is a bit excessive you don't need 1.5 mm, anything smaller rated at 240v will do as the current drawn is minimal.

As for the earth, there is often a metal tag inside the junction box that can be attached to if necessary. But if you have double insulated fixtures it is not required."

That's great, thanks very much LooseSeal & DH :) And don't worry, I haven't been going anywhere near it without switching off at the fuse box.

Off to B&Q tomorrow for some cable then.

Actually, one more questions. These are the light fittings I bought, it doesn't say anywhere about double insulated, so should I assume they are not and earth them?

Those lights you have look to have a metal case in which case yes they should be connected to an earth, inside the black connection box you should have 3 connections, Live, Neutral and an earth (the earth will be joined to the case of the light) Normally you have two sets of cables going into the light connection box, one is supply and then daisy chained to the next light etc.... not always the case as some times they are wired individually back to a junction box

Thanks beaufontboy