Good afternoon everybody...being living in my first home for about 3yrs now. Been doing simple repair here and there, but now I have to replace my outside light post (broke) which is located in the center of my front lawn. There electrical running with indoor light switch, would light to switch to solar but several can find one that has good review with long last lighting.
Be sure you know which breaker it's on and turn that off.
Don't rely on the switch only
Please try to proof read before you post, I found the above hard to understand.
I think the above says you want to switch to solar even though you have wired power.
Not a good idea.
I've yet to see a solar powered light put out anything more than a dim glow.
Carefully dig out the old one and replace. I dug out one that had been planted in cement. It's hard work but it can be done.
I apologize Dan. Yes, you understood correctly.Thanks for the reply. If my current light post is in fact mounted onto a cement block, which tools do you recommend that I utilize?
Dan, you're very likely responding to troll. Just compare happytuning's email addy with these people who "hit and run" with a single post and almost never return to answer follow-ups or acknowledge people's replies:
"CCK10"
"lorie"
In my opinion, you are lucky to have power running to the light. I would not substitute a solar fixture for a wired fixture.
If it were me, I would replace the current fixture with another wired fixture. I would buy one that has a motion sensor with a dusk to dawn setting. That would give you the choice of "on all night", "on when it senses motion" or "on 24-7" if you so choose.
I have yet to see solar lights that are bright enough or last long enough to be of any use. Granted, I've never owned any solar lights, but when I walk the dogs at night and see the wimpy light put out by those solar power landscape lights, I always wonder why people even bother.
I'm not sure if code requires a lamp post to be protected by a GFI, but if it were me doing the installation, I'd want it to be a GFI regardless of what the code says.
Of course, this all assumes that the existing wiring for the lamp post is installed correctly and is in good shape.
Is the concrete block big enough to mount a light with a base on it? They make them that have a mounting ring about 6-8" in diameter that you put down with masonry anchors, then bolt the light post to that.
If you can do something like this, just cut the existing post off flush and splice in the new wires. This type of post is usually listed as an enclosure for a splice.
Plan B would be to dig around the concrete and see if the wire is actually embedded in concrete or if it is in a sleeve. If you can pull the wire out of the sleeve you get a fresh start on this.
Worst case, you need to get an underground splice kit and splice in a new piece of wire. At that point you might as well just go after the concrete with a sledge hammer. Alternately move the light a little closer to the house, depending on how much wire you can salvage.
What I did was dig around the post to expose the block then split with a rock chisel.
I have one of those 30 - 40 lb 5 foot breaker bars that I'd try if I had to do it again.
Mainly you want to avoid cutting the wires that runs through the block. When I did it, the block of cement split apart after some pounding.
Needless to say, I did not use cement to put in the new post.
The place is crawling with trolls, but he did ask an on topic question, that's refreshing in itself.
He also apologized and followed up with another reasonable question. Hey, we're on a roll.
I remember all too well my battle with the lamp post so I'm happy to share. Not to overstate, cracking open a concrete block isn't all that hard. I'm pretty sure the wire is almost always going to be embedded in the concrete but it should come free. You don't want to cut it, creating a water proof extension would be a challenge.
Yes, there's that. But the question remains. Why would someone create over a dozen aliases to post on-topic stuff? I suppose the answer's going to be closely related to why trolls post reams of off-topic crap generally.
Well, that can be attributed to being outted and afraid that no one will respond in the future to any of the many "example.com" trolls.
There's no denying that the information could be useful to someone searching the archives for "post lighting." I just wanted to alert you to the research I did that shows what appears to be the same person creating sock puppet after sock puppet.
Now back to my running OT discussion with Trader re: the missing jetliner. (-: At least I know he's not a sock puppet.
Take your pick, sock puppet or just plain nasty. I think I'll go with the puppet(s).
Very good. As always, I appreciate the responses. You guys almost lost with with that troll topic. But anywho, I will be posting up pics as I begin to tackle this project.
+1 to the above. Regarding the GFCI, code doesn't require it, unless it has a receptacle. Depending on where it;s located and where the nearest receptacle is, adding one may not be a bad idea.
So, just curious, example.com is supposedly for demonstration purposes in documentation. It doesn't appear to be a real domain. How did you end up with the funny email address?
He made it up, that's how.
ANYONE can cause their email client to display anything as a "From" or "Reply to" address.
It could just as easily been " snipped-for-privacy@eatsownfecesandbarksatmoon.com"
Easy way to check is to cut and paste the address provided into a mail tester site.
See:
Yes but I'm curious as to why there are multiple posters with similar faked email addresses. Maybe there's some software generating those fake addresses...
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