Help! Wiring halogen downlights

[Aitch]

I'm replacing our old lights with halogen spots. The halogen transformer has terminals for L and N. The existing lights have three wires, red, green and black. What do I do? Any sparkies out there offer some advice?

[imdying]

Those are disturbingly easy to wire up. If you can't manage something that simple, STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM IT, and get an electrician. Not calling you stupid, but even clever people have burned their houses down, taking things like wedding photos etc with it.

[Aitch]

Those are disturbingly easy to wire up. If you can't manage something that simple, STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM IT, and get an electrician. Not calling you stupid, but even clever people have burned their houses down, taking things like wedding photos etc with it.

I know they're easy, but even clever people struggle to make three wires go into two terminals without doubling one terminal up. All I need to know is do I drop one wire or do I put two wires onto one terminal! (Stupid people guess and then burn their house down.......)

[Ixion]

Uh, by definition, a transformer with only two terminals is an impossibility.

[Aitch]

Two in, two out

[Ixion]

That makes more sense. So one MIGHT assume (but you know about assumptions!) that L and N are "Load" and "Neutral" respectively. Which would make wwring self evident.

[Virago]

As mentioned, fairly self-evident.

The black wire goes in N (neutral).

The red wire goes in L (live, or line, or load....). Often this is labelled as P (phase), or A (active).

The green wire..... Are you sure there's no earth terminal? Is the transformer metal-bodied? If so, it should be earthed. Sometimes the earth terminal is a stud or bolt.

[Aitch]

Thanks for all your help. The transformers are all plastic. I've left the green wire off and the lights are working just fine! And before anyone asks, yes the transformers are as far away from the lights as they'll go!

[Swoop]

Old lighting circuits have 2 wires "Live" and "Neutral".
(A = "active" or live...)

New circuits have an Earth, also.
This is to prevent newer, leaky buildings from becoming too dry.

[Pixie]

L stands for Live or Line
Load would be on the secondary and is not polarised for a HI lamp.

Connect the earth wire from the house to the transformer casing.
DO NOT connect earth to the L or N terminals of the transformer.