Trying to fit an IKEA bathroom light

Question

Hi, i'm Trying to fit an IKEA bathroom light and my house has the old wiring colours of red & black where as the ikea light use the new system of brown, blue and green/yellow for earth.. here's my problem.. The wires coming out of the ceiling are 2 red and 2 black.. 2 red wires connect into one terminal in the back of the existing light socket and the 2 black wires connect into seperate terminals..

So as i've know red is live and the 2 red wires connect to the live terminal of the ikea light but what about the 2 black wires? at the moment they connect into different terminals how do i know which to connect where.. thanks for any help you can offer..

Answer 1

The black wires currently attach to two seperate terminals while the red wires are attached to a single terminal on the existing light?  This doesn't sound right to me.  

The existing light should only have two terminals or wires to connect to.  If you have a voltage meter, do this - turn the meter to the V~ setting for AC power and turn the switch to the light off.  Next, touch one lead to one black wire and the other lead to the other black wire.  With the switch off you should have zero volts and with the switch on you should have 120 volts.  If you find this to be the case, connect the brown wire from the new light to one black wire and connect the blue wire to the other black wire.  To connect the green wire you will need to attach this to the metal bow with a machine s***w.  There should be some holes in the back of the box for this purpose.  The red wires in the bow should be left connected together.

This is my best guess without seeing the light(s) and without a voltage reading.  Good luck.

Answer 2

the blacks are neutral and blue on the new switch,

if you have 4 wires it's using the light as a conector to go off to something else,

The only other problem is that sometimes they use the black as a return from the wall switch and the other will be neutral it should be marked as a live but not always.

so the live source comes into the light on 1 red wire with it's neutral

than it goes up to the switch on the other red cable and because it needs to return to the light from the switch they use the black as a return live to run the light.

the best way to tell is to use a volt meter on form the nuetral to the lives and determine which cable is the n and the return live,

sorry it's so confusing,

the lod black in the lights n hole is n,

and the other is the live feed from the switch not a n,

Answer 3

Before something horrible happens invest in some professional rewiring mate instead of a new bathroom suite.

Answer 4

Here is how your wiring probably works.

One red (permanent live) and one black (neutral) come from your fuse box to the light.

The second red goes from the permanent live to the switch input.

The other black comes from the switch output (switched live)

You need to connect one black wire (neutral) to the blue in the light and the other black wire (switched live) to the brown. Leave the two red ones connected together but not to anything else.

You may have difficulty identifying the two blacks, BE CAREFUL.