The wiring procedure for an AC LED light involves turning off the breaker, removing the old fitting, sealing the wiring, attaching the fitting, connecting the wires, grounding the fixture, and finally attaching the light fixture. Solar outdoor lighting fixtures range from $10 to $200 and require no hard wiring, making them suitable for mounting and installing on your house exterior, fence, or yard.
In this step-by-step DIY guide, you will learn how to install and wire exterior wall lights with a PIR sensor to create a secure and attractive feature lighting setup. Before installing an outdoor light fixture, call your utility company to check for underground utilities to avoid digging up buried wires and creating an electrical hazard.
Turn off the power to the exterior and connect the cable cores to the correct terminals within the unit or its flex cores using strip connectors. Fix the light to your wall and determine the voltage required by the bulbs, either 12 V or 120 V. If they are 12 V, you need a transformer. Clip one wire onto the free penny and another onto the free nail, then clip the other ends of the wires onto the terminal wires sticking out.
Ensure that your cord is not plugged in and assess your wires. The light fixture has three wires: white, black, and copper. Follow the step-by-step instructions and tips for trenching, conduit, and wiring to install and wire outdoor lights.
📹 How To Install An Exterior Light And 3 Common Mistakes To Avoid
Installing an exterior light is an approachable DIY project for most homeowners. With that said there are 3 common mistakes I see …
📹 HOW TO WIRE LOW VOLTAGE LANDSCAPE LIGHTING – outdoor landscape lighting connectors
Must watch video if you are looking into learning how to connect your landscape lighting wire. FREE pdf download: The …
on low voltage lighting, there really isin’t any polarity…. MR-16 and other Bi-Pin lamps don’t have any “Right” way of going in….. they just plug in…. on LED lighting, they may need polarity, but I’m pretty sure that they work the same way. unless the bulbs are specifically marked + and -….. I use the 20 Watt halogen lamps on my system and have never had any problem…. what brand light fixtures do you use? VOLT, or another brand…. I use Best Brand Landscape Lighting…. great pricing and nice fixtures.
A few other options: Heavy duty crimp connectors plus outdoor heat shrink. These provide a very secure connection and fantastic insulation (the heat shrink’s inside is coated with a glue that melts and expands when heated, so it fills every gap). Takes an extra minute or two, and requires a dedicated crimping tool + either a blow torch or heat gun, but it’s far more durable. Plus if you’re doing an in-line splice, it’s way less bulky and visible than those grease covers. 3M Scotchloks. 3-terminal grease connector that’s durable, provides great mechanical durability, and is specifically designed for splicing an 18awg lead into the middle of an existing 12awg run. These are more on the professional side, and a tiny bit more expensive, but I cannot tell you how many hours I’ve spent diagnosing malfunctioning systems only to find a failure in a splice because the original installer used cheapo connectors.
Hey just found your website. Great articles and you make this easy to understand. I instantly subscribed! I have mapped out my outdoor plan and have a lot done except purchasing my fixtures. Problem is I still don’t really get wiring. This is definitely something I have to do or see being done to understand. Which one of your products goes into depth about wiring and perhaps may even have a sample wiring diagram of a job you’ve done. I’m thinking if I see a wiring diagram it will help me. I’m a visual learner, ya know? My project looks to be 20 fixtures, mostly spot lights, about 5 low watt puck lights and 3 path lights. This is all on paper as a rough draft though!
I installed my lights and they worked well. However, after 2 months and many rainy days, one of the lights became very dim. I just opened it at the wire connection yesterday. Apparently it was wet with dirt in it. I used the twist covers with the spike prongs to connect them. Now after looking at your article, I’m like well “duh, I could just connect the wires instead of using the end piece that comes with the light.”
I recently installed low voltage setup at my residence, used the blue wire nuts with red insert at the bottom filled with die electric grease in the nut.. worked very well. Push wire thru red cap twist like regular wire nut and will keep dirt out.. there like 8.00 for 20 pack…. passing it along as another technique … thanks for vid!
Trying to figure out what’s going on with my Portfolio brand, Lowe’s purchased, lights. They are about 5 years old and one by one have stopped working. I assumed they were the connectors (they are those awful ones with the twist down connector where the two points bite into the cable) but I have directly connected them to the feed line as well (with the caps as you showed here) and they have never worked that way. I bought a 6 light kit and only two of the lights work. I know it isn’t the wire itself too, because the light on the farthest end of said wire still works fine. I suppose it’s possible the lights went bad but that seems like a really high failure rate. They didn’t all fail at the same time. The first failure was maybe two years ago; I just removed that light since I felt it looked bad. The other three failed shortly after.
Oh, that was painful to watch. Those are Buchanan Splice Caps. The only correct and dependable way to crimp a BSC is to use the right tool. The crimping tool you used is perfectly fine to crimp ordinary wire connectors like rings and spades. The advantage to using a Buchanan dedicated crimper is that using that, the splice cap gets crimped from all 4 sides at the same time. If a splice cap is crimped using the correct tool, the connection is almost perfect and it’s permanent. The waterproof gel cover works even if you use the wrong crimper, as you did. But, if you are not using a waterproof gel cover, the correct way to insulate the splice cap is to put on a Buchanan insulated cover. But, if you crimp the splice cap with anything other than the Buchanan crimping tool, the Buchanan insulated cover will not work because the splice cap is so badly deformed using the wrong tool that the insulated cover will not click on the splice cap and stay in place.
Those are crimp ferrules, and you should use the right size ferrule and tool in the proper way, not crush the whole thing in the flats of the tool. You’ll get away with it in low voltage and low current (LED light) but this is not good practice. Also you should bury the connection deep in the cover as pointed out by others.
This guy should he banned. I can tell he never worked with electricity or any termination in that fact. Just look how much wire he exposed when stripping. He did not even know the fastner is a merit and when twisting two strands together he did not even cross or twist the number of times required per gauge