Install Suspended Ceiling Lights
A suspended light fixture, one that dangles down off the ceiling on a length of chain or cord, gives you options for changing the look of a room and the nature of the lighting. It's also a little more complicated to install than a standard ceiling fixture. Start by considering whether a hanging light is really right for that spot. (Centered over a dining room table, yes; hanging randomly in a hallway, probably not.)
Instructions
1. Turn off all power to the room at the house circuit box. Put your ladder under the existing fixture, and remove it from the ceiling by unscrewing the mounting screws that hold it to the electrical box. Disconnect all the electrical wiring between the box and the existing fixture. (Note: If there's no existing electrical box in the ceiling, one will have to be cut in, attached to a joist, correctly wired to a switch, and tied into the circuit box. Consult an electrician.)
2. Climb back up the ladder with your new hanging fixture. Set the light portion of the fixture on the paint shelf of your ladder. With the chain or cord that is between the light portion and the ceiling-canopy portion extended out to its longest possible length, hold the ceiling-canopy up to the electrical box.
3. Connect the wires coming out of the ceiling-mounted portion to the wires coming out of the electrical box, matching corresponding colors. Usually there will be one white and one black wire coming out of the box and a similar pair coming out of the fixture. Connect them by holding the wire ends side-by-side and sealing them in a wire nut. If there is a bare copper ground wire coming out of the electrical box, hook it around the green ground screw on the mounting hardware of the fixture.
4. Set the ceiling-canopy part of the light up against the box and loosely fasten one of the two screws that will hold the fixture to the box. Don't tighten the screw completely, and don't fasten the other screw, so that the ceiling-canopy is hanging off the ceiling on one side, allowing you to continue access the inside of the fixture.
5. If the light is hanging from a cord of cloth or other material, slide up the cord, threading it through the ceiling-canopy until the light is at the height you want and tucking the excess into the hollow space of the canopy. Secure the cord at that level by tightening the securing bolt and nut that the cord is running through on the bottom of the canopy. If it's hanging from a chain, use your bolt cutters to cut the chain at the desired length.
6. Tuck the wires up into the electrical box. Secure the other screw on the canopy to affix it in the proper position on the ceiling. Put in a bulb and turn on the power.
Tags: Ceiling Lights, chain cord, coming electrical, cord that, existing fixture,