Pole Lamp Replacement

Feb 24, 2009 5 Replies
J

Our house is about 30 years old. When it was built, we had a pole lamp installed down at the end of the driveway.



It was electric with the wires running in a piece of thin-wall conduit from the house to the pole.



Now apparently the wiring has failed. I was waiting for spring thaw to start digging up the front lawn to replace the wiring and probably the fixture.



A friend mentioned that I should look for a solar pole lamp to replace what is there and save all the digging and wiring.



I don't need a lot of light, just something for the newspaper delivery person to aim at. I did some searching and found some lights. The big problem is I don't like the styles that I had found. We need something a little more modern looking than the typical coach light style.



My questions are:



Does anyone have experience with solar pole lamps?



Any recommend sources?



Or, any other alternative ideas to eliminate the need to dig a trench through my front yard?



Thanks,



Joe


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W

on 2/24/2009 10:09 AM (ET) Joe Beda wrote the following:

No Problem. Look here.

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Pick one with a stake that goes into the ground and you can insert the stake into the pole top.

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R

Solar lights work for a while, then they die. If you don't want to run new AC, try retrofitting it with low voltage AC. You'll still have to run new wire, but you can cut the lawn and tuck the wire down just a few inches instead of trenching.

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J

Thats what I helped my neighbor do, sort of. She had a coach light that went bad and already had some outdoor low voltage lighting so I converted her coach light to low voltage and connected ito her existing lights that ran with in a couple of feet of the light. You could make this LED. Lets not talk about the price she was quoted to replace coach lamp and wiring.

Jimmie

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K

If you have conduit in place, why not just pull new wire through it?

keith

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A

Because after 30 years, the conduit is probably rotted away and/or full of water? And if it goes all the way, how would you get the wire through there? (probably 3/4" at most...)

I'd be surprised if the conduit runs all the way out, unless local code required it. Common practice was to use conduit through the foundation wall, and burial-rated wire the rest of the way. The coiled wire was usually tied off to the side of the house until finish grading was done, an then buried shovel or ditch-witch blade deep out to the light. Not uncommon for it to get lost or cut otherwise. I had to hunt for a few of them back in the day. (being the kid on site, I always got stuck with the odd chores like that.)

-- aem sends...

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