Whether you’re planning to add new outside lighting to your home, or you’re carrying out some rewiring work and want to make certain your current outdoor lights are connected in a great way, it’s necessary to consider whether or not they want their very own circuit. Outdoor lights should be on a separate circuit -that way, if something goes wrong, they don’t day trip the indoor lights too.
What Circuit Should Outdoor Lights Be On
There are two main types of circuits that you can use when wiring any form of lighting( or indeed anything electrical) – series or parallel. Still, also the circuit is one harmonious circle, with every light wired ‘ in series’ after the former one, If you choose a series circuit. In a resemblant circuit, each light is on its own circle.
With garden lighting, there are a few things to consider, but the most egregious one will be how complicated your circuit needs to be.
Suppose you’re only installing a couple of wall lights. In that case, you or your electrician might have fewer problems wiring a parallel circuit. Still, for stake or string lights, you need to think about how you could wire in parallel without tearing up your whole garden or decking.
Parallel circuits are always better when possible because if there’s a fault on the circuit, it’ll only affect the part of the loop it’s on.
But wiring in parallel outdoors isn’t easy. Indoors, you have the protection of your home and its natural defenses against weather and other interfering factors.
Outdoors, you need to make sure all cables are safe. That means complete waterproofing and also protection from plant roots and animals too. A series circuit might make more sense if you’re adding outdoor lighting without significant emendations.
But if you’re adding out-of-door lights that are part of a bigger theater overhaul, as is frequently the case, make sure to plan your lighting circuits ASAP so you can safely insulate and bury them as demanded.
What Cable Is Suitable For Outdoor Lighting
Your outdoor lights circuit is uncovered to a lot of extra risks than your indoor lighting. Think about it:
- How often does it rain indoors?
- How many wild animals do you have roaming inside your walls, potentially nibbling your wiring?
- How many plants do you have growing and extending their roots through your indoor circuitry?
Plus, also you need to think about your own mishaps – while yes, it’s possible to hammer a nail into a wire indoors if you aren’t careful, that’s not common. But how constantly might you be digging with a shovel or mowing the lawn near an outdoor cable?
So that’s a lot to consider. This is why you need to suppose precisely about guarding your wiring when installing out-of-door lights. You’ll thus want to use SWA cabling. SWA stands for steel-wire-armored, which gives you a hint as to why you should use it.
It’s insulated with rubber rather than PVC. PVC-sheathed cable can be watertight, but it’ll be weakened by exposure to UV light from the sun and could crack.
The steel armoring will help cover it from animals that could bite through the rubber in weaker areas.
However, you’ll still need to bury the cable due to the fact that even steel-armored cable can be reduced via lawn mowers or shovels. 1.5mm cabling is typically the proper thickness to lift adequate load for outside lights. It will be invulnerable enough to use safely.
Can You Wire An Outside Light To An Indoor Switch
Numerous people will install motion detectors or ambient light detectors, ensuring that the outdoor lighting comes on when demanded.
But utmost of the time, you’re going to want some form of manual control, so a switch will be demanded. So you’ll be suitable to wire an outside light to an inner switch, giving you control over the lights.
Having said that, there are some important considerations, again around the safe installation of your lighting circuit.
You won’t have any problems if you’ve wired the whole circuit for your outdoor lights as standalone and you’re only using an inner switch. Handed you’ve followed all the advice above for making sure it’s safe.
But suppose you’re wiring your outdoor lights on any inner circuit and you don’t have the outdoor rudiments fully sealed. In that case, you’re risking danger because bad weather could fluently get humidity into your indoor circuit and beget a major hazard.
Can You Have Lights And Outlets On The Same Circuit
In Oz some outlets are permitted on a lighting circuit when installed specifically for the connection of light fittings and low wattage items like exhaust or ceiling fans or timepieces and are above a certain height and aren’t readily accessible for normal outlet use. In this case they perhaps wired with lines rated for lighting circuits.
What Kind Of Lights Do You Need For Outdoor Use
Make sure that you only fit weatherproof lights that are suitable for outdoor use and that your circuit is RCD-protected. The cores of three-core SWA are coloured brown, black and slate, and you must fit green/ yellow sleeving over the black core at every connection to show this is being used as earth.