Kitchen Cabinet Lighting

[Litttle Shonet]

Hi guys.

Just want some advice please.

Kitchen due to be plastered in next seven days, and customer has kitchen arriving on the 20th June (Lights arriving with kitchen)

Lights are 12v. My question is, how do I wire in these lights and transformers after ceiling is up and plasteed along with the walls?

Don't know if lights are hard wired, or on plugs, so can't put cable in walls yet. Transformers coming with lights, so can't wire them in yet.

Company kitchen ordered from weren't very helpful: First they said they were 12v, and told me to use '2.5mm'. Then told me they were 240v. Found out since definately 12v but thats all the info I've got.

Flooring above is solid board, not floorboard. I have the relevant cutter for solid board but don't like cuttng boards if I don't have to.

Do I tell customer to hold off on the plastering until I've fitted lights or is there any other way of doing this?

Cheers

 

[Andy™]

take a feed to where lights are going, and a cable to the other side if necessary. fix transformer to underside of unit when they arrive and link cable either to primary of Tx to another Tx, or secondary and straight into other light

 

[Litttle Shonet]

Andy

thanks for that. Will have a chat with customer over the weekend t see if the're ok with the transfomers under cabinets

 

[ProDave]

I take it you are talking under cabinet lighting? (if not ignore this post)

My preference is mount the tx on top of the wall units (providing there is enough clearance between top of wall unit and ceiling). It's a lot easier than fixing them underneath IMO and then drop the 12V wire down from the tx to just below the cabinet for the lights.

The biggest "problem" is identifying in advance the exact height the wall units are to be mounted and how tall they are. Often the customer does not know until they arrive, particularly if the top of the wall units must line up with the top of a larder unit of unknown height.

If the wall between the worktop and kitchen units is going to be tiled, then you have more room to manoeuvre. Run the cable a little lower in the wall than you think. You can then chip the plaster back to raise it to the finished height knowing any mess you make of the plastering will be tiled over.

 

[tom1]

i normaly put transformers on top and drop the elv cable behind unit, there is usualy a small cavity and you just need to nip a bit out the top and bottem of the unit, or they may be an infill you could drop cable down. needs a bit more co-ordination with kitchen fitters or being a bit nifty with a rod, or as andy says screw transformers to bottem. find out were power is coming from ie, lighting circuit or sfcu off the ring

 

[Evans Electric]

See if they have one of those computer generated drawings of the kitchen layout , most do. That will help.

Probably the best way now is chase a box in for a switched spur next to a sky rocket , a 1.00mm up onto the top of the cupboards . Fit your trannies on top and wire down the back .

 

[sellers]

I guess your either talking about in cabinet lights, or the small halogen under cabinet lights that require a transformer.

There are also fluorescent undercabinet lights, for those I wire off a local socket with switched fused spur.

As for the 12v cabinet lights you need a feed to each transformer, often the kits come with a 4 way connector box to allow 4 lights off 1 transformer, but beware if you have lights on different cabinets with a visual break inbetween (on different walls, or extract fan inbetween cabinets) you will need a 240v feed above each cabinet.

 

[tom1]

if they insist that they come on with the kitchen light or from same switch i wolud drop a feed at celing height and leave enough cable coiled up to take down to top of the wall units to feed the trannies

 

[SteveT]

I have just run two sets of lights at differing ends of the kitchen. I fitted two sfs just above top line of wall unit, off main lighting so they come on with lights (as requested by client) they can therefore be isolated if required. Txers will be on top of cupboard, secured and with plenty of air space around them. 12v will then be run down behind cavity of cupboard and clipped in posistion behind pelmet with plastic self adhesive clips. very neat and tidy

 

[Litttle Shonet]

Thanks fellas.

Will put all your ideas to customer, and take it from there.

Cheers

 

[kme]

FYI:

If there is a tall housing in the kitchen; they`re normally 2120mm to the top - and that gives the top height of the wall units .

As Dave says, I also prefer to have Tx on top of cabinet, and LV cables coming down( except on my own kitchen......the wall units with glass cabinets have cold cathodes in for illumination; and you can`t extend the invertor cabling; so they`ve had to go underneath ( )

KME