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Acceptable-Fox-4341 t1_iycrv4k wrote

Not an electrician but have been doing up my old house....

  1. Lights here in the UK are usually on a "loop in system". So there is power flowing through the loop even if the specific light fixture is off. The plastic part with the connections is known as a ceiling rose

https://www.practicaldiy.com/electrics/lighting-wiring/light-wiring-loop.php

Behind the plastic should be three cables. One coming from the prior light fixture, one Going to the next, and one to the switch.

There needs to be a circuit at all times even if your light is off... Otherwise the switch would turn off all the lights down the line.

The middle three should be all the lives. The flex N should be the two neutrals from the loop and the neutral from the light fitting. The remaining two should be the switched live (black with red tape) and the live going to the fitting.

At a glance it looks like it's wired correctly. Id assume it's probably the light fitting or ceiling rose at fault. You can get a new one for less than a fiver.

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usernameandnumbers t1_iyd02r7 wrote

I had this exact issue and couldn’t work out why my light wouldn’t work, it was the living room light and it turned out the kitchen wiring wasn’t correct so electric wasn’t “flowing” into the living room.

OP check the wiring of your other lights on the same floor

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BSPirat OP t1_iydbak7 wrote

Everything else works except of this one. And as I mentioned I don’t have anything on the Flex L side, so the issue is in the cable that comes from the switch to the lamp - the black one with red sleeve.

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generationgav t1_iydj47x wrote

>Without the schematics I can’t understand why the 3 ports in the middle are live even when the switch is off. They are named ‘Loop in’. The ones on the right are named ‘Flex L’ and the ones on the left are ‘Flex N’.

Change your switch first, I had an issue with mine I couldn't work out and it turns out the switch had broken itself.

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ToolMeister t1_iydnjt9 wrote

OP says switch works as designed

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generationgav t1_iydnt70 wrote

Yes - so they did.

If it's live going into the wire and not live coming out of the wire (so to speak) then sounds like a break in the wire.

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ToolMeister t1_iydo4l3 wrote

Check all connections (breaker off), pull on the wires to see if anything is loose.

The hot wire of your fixture (brown) doesn't seem to get power from the switched hot of your switch (red sleeved black).

If you ruled that out, measure continuity between the switch and the fixture to see if the wire is broken somewhere

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Just_wanna_talk t1_iyd7dnj wrote

What's the benefit of this "loop in" system? It seems quite complicated, possibly dangerous, and requires more hardware than a simpler system that we use in north america.

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kilrcola t1_iyd7rvz wrote

It uses less cable initially. We use loop at the switch now because often lighting switches have an led indicator which needs a neutral and also ease of adding other circuits off the switch.

Loop at the light is the old way here but it's still pretty common in Australia as it only requires two cables per switch group, the new way has S N E for each load. More cables.

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