Spotlights blowing fuse problem?

[Steve]

Hi Folks About 2yrs ago I changed my bathroom lighting from 1 light to three

50watt GU10 spotlights each one daisy chained to the next. The second of these lightbulbs has just gone (age or use?) when the pull switch was turned on and both times the 5amp fuse went in the consumer unit. Its one of the old wired types and so I will need to change to an MCB type. My question is- is it normal for these bulbs to blow the 5amp fuse when finally pack in??. I have just fitted another 6 (2x3) of these spots can I expect the fuse to blow each time?. Cheers Steve

[Will]

It's not unheard of. When they blow the gas can turn to plasma and cause a short across what was the filament. They're supposed to have built in fuses, but these rarely work.

As to whether it will happen every time - in my experience, yes. We had some in our old house, and the quick fix was to install an mcb in place of the cartridge fuse.

Cheers, Will

[Steve]

Thanks for that Will I`ll do just that. Cheers Steve

[meow2222]

Mains halogens are more likely to do this than GLS bulbs. And youve got 3 instead of 1.

MCBs are worse at this than fuses, you wont be doing yourself any favour by putting an mcb in.

Simplest solution is lose the mains halogen lighting, and either put low voltage halogen in, which is immune to this, or preferably something better.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Its fairly normal for ANY (mains) bulb that blows in this house to trip the relevant 6A MCB...

Strangely enough the LV spots NEVER do.