Wall Light back plate

May 12, 2021 Last reply: 5 years ago 11 Replies

Annoying situation. My house has locations for 2 wall lights with architrave boxes for the wiring.



We bought 2 wall lights and annoyingly the the back plate (strip with turned up ends) is shorter so I can only use one hole. With the stiffness of the cable, it is difficult to get the wall light flat against the wall.



Have I missed a trick?


Terminate the cables shorter in the box and use a short length of flex with wagos to the lights. Maybe even replace the terminal strip on the lights (if it has one) with wagos to the luminaire internal wiring.

Owain

Owain Lastname snipped-for-privacy@gowanhill.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

Sound good advice. I am sure cables get stiffer with age"

Or older fingers are less dextrous.

Owain

Nah - it's this newfangled solid core stuff what's stiffer than multi-stranded cable was.

But considerably smaller in total size. Smallest stranded was 3/029. A lot bigger than 1mm.

You could make some adapter plates to screw inside the architrave box with new holes for self-tappers where you want them (and hole for the cable!). Something like 2mm aluminium or 1.2mm stainless should work.

Roger Hayter snipped-for-privacy@hayter.org wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@mid.individual.net:

That would be ideal - the architrave box is well behind the plaserboard. Trouble is we have a decorator in and he is probably going to paint that wall today! (Too old for paper stripping!)

I am sure the insulation gets stiffer with age.

At least it is not LSZH T&E.

Possibly the bracket is actually long enough and the idea is to insert a screw one side so it just bites on the end of the thread and then do the same on the other side. Now as each screw is tightened a little in turn the bracket ends start bending outwards and the screw holes downward forcing the light fitting to be closer to the wall. Perhaps supply your own longer fixing screws.

Also, often lights are designed in all sorts of countries and hence they can fall foul of the needs in some countries for a bit of wiggle room. Hardly a new problem. Some of the old Woolworth light fittings were designed I think for people with impossibly mall fingers and indeed wires that could bend 90 degrees with no radius. The memories of filing away bits of plastic still remain. Brian

Extend the backplate/strip with a piece of similar thickness steel strip by pop riveting it onto to the back then drill a hole suitably spaced about 58mm between centres should do it and a bit of a sloppy hole 4mm+ should give you a bit of waggle room.

Richard

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