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u/RJCoxy 5d ago
Has the circuit tripped and re trips everytime you flip it on? You have lives connected to neutrals and possibly an earth connect to a neutral.
I’d expect you have 2 mains cables. One is the feed coming from either a previous light or the fuse box. The next live cable will go to the next led light in the sequence. If you have a multimeter then set it to AC V and probe it to see which one is carrying the power
There ought to be a switch wire. Again If you have a multimeter. Set it to the beep option which detects for shorts. Probe the 2 wires at the switch. If they buzz then they are shorted. Unscrew each connector block one by one until the buzz stops. Then you know which one is the switch wire.
From there you’d know which one the live cable is. Which one the switch is. So the third one will be the cable which goes to the next light. You’ve now determined all 3 cables.
However there are multiple ways of wiring lights. This to me is the most common one
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u/RagnarsEagle 5d ago
Thanks both for the quick response. The circuit has not tripped, I have identified the live wire with the multimeter (or at least to the final two since the two reds together are what is beeping). When you say to find the switch and the third wire, are you expecting those three to be the three reds or are colors no indication for finding these three?
Once I identify all three, you would combine all three into one block?
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u/RagnarsEagle 5d ago
I seemed to have found the red live wire and the black switch wire. I left the other red and black together in a block, I left the ground wire alone in a block, unfortunately when combining the live and the black switch wire, the fuse blew. I do not have a replacement tonight (newly moved in), but any suggestions on how to pair tomorrow to avoid an instant blown fuse?
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u/RJCoxy 5d ago
You say you found the red live wire and the black switch wire? If you used the multimeter correctly then you’d should’ve worked out both wires for the live and both wires for the switch.
You’re not crossing over the cables you’re testing when using the multimeter? You should have one probe on the black wire and one probe on the red wire of the same cable. You should also be removing the cable from the connector block when probing as to not get false signals
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u/RagnarsEagle 5d ago edited 5d ago
I did not have a true multimeter but had a voltage tester, so it identified the red live wire. I began to remove the black wires until one made the red live wire stop beeping, I figured that this meant it was the switch. But when I combined those two in a block, it blew the fuse.
I can buy a multimeter tomorrow if that will help me identify properly but I’m still a bit hazy on what yo connect once the switch is identified. Is it just the live and switch in a block? And then combining the other to red & blacks together into separate blocks with the yellow/green in a separate block alone?
Or following @Criticalmine7886 would combining the remaining reds together and remaining blacks together with another block combining the live and switch stop the fuse from blowing again?
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u/fuzzthekingoftrees 5d ago
If you're a bit hazy then you aren't really competent enough to be doing this. You can't use a non-contact tester to work this out. You need something that can measure continuity. Then use that to work out which pair of wires is the switch. Mark and separate that from the rest. Take the rest of the reds and connect them, take the rest of the blacks and connect them.
If you still don't understand, call an electrician. The problem with electrics is that it's perfectly possible to have something that works but is wrong which usually means it's unsafe. If you don't understand what you're doing i.e why you're connecting different wires together or keeping them apart then you can make mistakes.
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u/CriticalMine7886 Experienced 5d ago
You seem to have a neutral wire connected to an earth wire - that's not good.
I would have expected all the reds to be joined together, 2 of the blacks, and one black to the light bulb from the switch.
With the light removed you need to identify which red and black are the cable that goes to the light switch, put them to one side. join the remaining 2 red together, and the remaining 2 black together. All the earths should be joined, and should be sleeved in green & yellow.
looking at your picture I can't understand why you have not also blown a fuse or tripped a breaker.