Monday, August 31, 2009

Home Impovements: Lighting 3

That Fuzz has been a busy fella these days doing his part to make this Trailer in the Woods into our new home. His Sweetie has been busy too.
It may have been noticed, in some older pix of the kitchen, these wires hanging out of the ceiling. Originally there was a hideous wooden box up there containing a equally hideous florescent light fixture.
The Fuzz removed this, although not without incident (it dropped on his poor bald spot) but it had not yet been replaced. Now it was time to tackle this job.
His Sweetie wanted to replace it with one of these Track Lighting Fixtures, similar to what she had seen in the Local Daughter's kitchen. It seemed like a good idea to The Fuzz, although it did take a while to pick one out at the Home Improvement Store.
Now that it had finally been purchased, it was time for the installation. Since that hideous old light had been attached to the rafters, there was no electrical-box-thing there to mount this Elegant New Light to. The Fuzz got one from that handy Home Improvement Store and went to work.
First, he had to enlarge the hole in the ceiling to fit this new box. (Those interested, can follow the procedure with these included pix.) This was accomplished with that always handy, little Dremel Tool, that he has used for similar jobs in the past.
Once that was accomplished, he attached this Elegant New Fixture to said box. Here's a look at it. But now he had to locate and attach the remaining supports as well. This was a little tricky since everything would have to line up just right.
First, he lightly traced the outline of these supports onto the ceiling and determined the direction the mounting bracket would have to be turned. Then, he took a deep breath and began to drill.
Next, since there was nothing there but sheetrock, he inserted a couple of those little screw things and hoped for the best.
If everything lined up, he could attach the light to these, and perhaps it would stay up there.
Next he screwed those little brackets to the ceiling and tried the fit. To his amazement, it fit. This process was repeated on the other side with equal success and he secured the whole Assembly up there where it belonged.
All that remained was to install the actual light "bulbs".
The Fuzz has learned through painful experience that it is bad luck to actually touch these little lights with one's fingers. He found that the manufactures (Chinese of course) had thoughtfully provided one of these small, suction-cup-things, just for this purpose.
And now, with everything hooked up it was time to turn on the juice for a test run.Pretty nice.
And here's a Night Shot.
There's still lots more to do, but things are coming along. We have actually been staying there quite a bit. We hope to have the internet up before too long, and then maybe y'all will hear a bit more from The Fuzz.

2 comments:

vi said...

Love the fixture! I didn't know they did things like that. It's looking good :-)

maria said...

I love the lights! that is way cool! i bet with how it is bent - you maximize your light too. very clever