7 Woeful Wiring Wrecks
LED landscape lighting is low voltage, so these epic fails likely won’t literally shock anyone– but they definitely short out over time. Here are seven landscape lighting Cincinnati installations that LUX has been called in to repair. Get ready to cringe!
This taut electrical wire is just asking to snap at the fulcrum made by the sidewalk edge. Or perhaps it will break when someone trips over it. We didn’t wait around to find out. Instead, we sawed a small channel across the sidewalk and concealed the wire. Hidden wires are both safer and more attractive.
We hate to see shoddy wiring like this. A homeowner spends a significant amount of money buying a landscape lighting transformer suitable for the outdoors, only for the entire system to be ruined eight inches after the wires leave the box. These wire nuts are meant for indoor use only, so they corrode over time. Plus, can you imagine seeing this rat’s nest every time you pull into your garage?
Here, the indoor wire nuts have made their way directly to the outdoors. This homeowner was lucky to get a few months’ service out of their landscape lighting Cincinnati installation. Rain, sun and dirt all worked together to take the system down. We only use gel-filled wire nuts rated for outdoor-use, and we always bury wire away from the destructive power of the sun.
This landscape lighting installer didn’t actually do any electrical work– they plugged the system into an outdoor outlet that is meant for temporary use. See that plastic cover on the outlet? It’s supposed to be closed most of the time. This setup is as unsightly and unworkable as our other epic fails– but it’s also pretty dangerous, too. Landscape lighting is designed to be wired into your home’s electrical system, not plugged into an outlet.
So many landscape lighting Cincinnati installers find running electrical wire from inside to outside to be an insurmountable challenge. So, they try to surmount it in the worst ways possible. This lazy trick exposes each wire to the damaging rays of the sun and the likelihood of breaking (from landscaping equipment to wildlife gnawing on them). We protected the wires with conduit and buried them at an appropriate depth.
If you thought the previous epic fail was bad, this one is worse! Everyone wants six holes drilled through their house, right? Plus, there’s the same problem that one or more of these wires will likely break in a few months. And the homeowner will be left with lights that don’t come on any longer.
This landscape lighting fail is equal parts ugly and unsustainable. When you imagine deck lighting, you likely don’t anticipate unappealing loose wires flopping around on the other side of the post. And you shouldn’t! There’s a better way, using conduit and care. What probably gets us the most about this picture is that the installer didn’t even try to drill the hole in the center of the post. Or maybe it’s those wire nuts poking out around the base. Regardless, we helped make it right for this customer.
Landscape Lighting Cincinnati:
We Can Help with Repair & Maintenance
If any of these epic fails look familiar from your own system, LUX Landscape Lighting can help! Each of these jobs were for a Cincinnati-area customer who was worried their outdoor lighting systems would never shine again. We repair and maintain all professional brands of landscape lighting, no matter who installed it. We’ve seen it all, and we welcome your lighting challenge!
Landscape Lighting Cincinnati:
Skip the Mayhem with a Quality Installer
When searching for landscape lighting Cincinnati installers, it’s so important to find a provider you can rely on. Here are a few tips (and why LUX Landscape Lighting is top of the class).
- Before getting a quote, narrow your search with 6 Must-Haves for Landscape Lighting Installers
- Compare other quotes with our Landscape Lighting Estimate Checklist
- Check out every company’s Google Reviews (See LUX’s Google Reviews here – 67 5-star reviews, as of this writing)
Whether you’re looking for repair, maintenance or installation, reach out to LUX Landscape Lighting for a free consultation. And if you want to see some more epic fails, check out “Epic Fails: Landscape Lighting Installers Gone Wrong.”
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