Club 80-90 Forums

Now that I'm on an electrical roll, I'm going to fix the broken 240v cabin strip light. The old tungsten filament one was too dim so would like to replace it with a lower wattage but brighter flourescent one. However the old one had a live, neutral and earth leads but the ones I've seen in the DIY stores only appear to have a live and neutral. Is this an issue and do I need an earthed strip light as it cannot be earthed through the van body (rubber tyres)?
Thanks in advance.

If you wish to keep the 240V light, just connect the earth to the metal chassis of the lamp holder, or, if it all plastic, attach the earth wire to one of the metal mounting screws.

Not sure why a 240 volt light in there though, nowadays a 12 volt LED strip light would be much more efficient

Thanks for that. You're right but in '88 I think that they had only just invented electricity let alone LED lights. Also it means that I can run the lighting off the 240v external power at the campsite rather than my batteries. However the next plan is to wire in a trickle charger that will charge the batteries when plugged into external 240v power so my kids cannot flatten the battery listening to music then leaving the stereo on whwn they leave the van.

OK, but bear in mind that a half decent leisure battery will run an LED strip light and an (average) stereo for days on end before a re-charge is required.