A beautiful glow can be created in your garden by using outdoor garden lighting. Installing garden lighting, though, would require electrical knowledge, which isn’t something anyone can do.
Outdoor lighting installation is one of the fantastic services the Fantastic Handyman team can provide. However, if you insist on completing the project yourself, follow these steps.
Here are the tools you need
- Package of outdoor lighting;
- The Spike;
- The Mattock Company;
- A box for outlets;
- Put paint on the walls;
- Screwdrivers with four different functions;
- Wrench with adjustable tension;
- Tester for voltage without touching it;
- Cutting/stripping wire;
- Shovel for trenching;
- Feeder cable buried underground.
Choosing the Right Outdoor Garden Lighting
This entire project will take approximately one day. Don’t underestimate the work involved. To begin, mark the exact spot where you want each outdoor lighting unit to be. Spray paint can be used to keep their positions.
After digging the trenches, connect each point. Those are the places you’ll need to bury the wire once you’ve installed the lighting posts. It is important to secure the wire to an existing power source. GFCI-protected outlets are required. You should also ensure the outlet you choose is not overloading the circuit and that the box is large enough to handle the extra wiring.
Installing outdoor lighting under the Building Regulations is classified as notifiable electrical work, so speak to your local council before proceeding.
Landscape path lighting: what you need to know
Electrical knowledge is required to install your outdoor lighting. Because of this, Fantastic Handyman doesn’t recommend doing such tasks without the expertise of an expert. Optimistically, you should proceed as follows if you know your way around electrics.
- Light fixtures should be assembled. Follow the directions included with your lighting package to complete the institutions. Try adding light bulbs and see if they all work. Replacing any faulty ones is a must.
- Fixtures should be placed in their respective locations. Put the lighting units in the designated areas as per your previous planning. It’s a good idea not to drive the stakes fully into the ground because you might want to move them later.
- Wire the fixture’s power source to the fixture’s wires. Alternatively, you can connect each landscape lighting fixture to the cable with a direct burial connector or hub. To solve potential troubleshooting issues, you recommend using a hub system to consolidate cable splices in each fixture region.
- Make sure all the lights are working. Test all lighting units with a voltmeter to make sure their voltage is between 9-15 volts. It is 10v to 12v for halogen lamps. The voltages on the home run should fall within the range if they are lower than the minimum.
- Wires should be buried. You will finally be able to take care of the trenches you dug between the lighting bodies once everything is working correctly.
- Nighttime is the best time to evaluate. When the day ends, you won’t know how well your project turned out until you see it under the lights at night. Most lighting fixtures can be adjusted, so the light is targeted at the exact area of your landscape you want illuminated to achieve maximum aesthetics.
Following is an overview of the process of installing outdoor lighting. One should, however, have adequate electrical and carpentry knowledge to do the job on their own. Others can hire a professional to handle this task for them.