[Others.009] Follow-up on Downlights Fire Warning

I mentioned in this post about downlights fire warning.

Today I found some information related to this from this web site on greenhouse.gov.au.

"Electrical wiring must be appropriately sized or it may overheat when covered by insulation. Have it inspected by a licensed electrician to ensure it can be safely covered by insulation."

"Allow clearance around appliances and fittings. Do not install insulation within 90mm of hot flues or exhaust fans, or within 25mm of recessed light fittings. (Retain a clearance of 90mm for low voltage downlights). Restrain loose-fill insulation with non-combustible barriers."

[Tips.011] Downlights could set fire to insulation in the roof if not installed properly

Thanks to information provided by clath from homeone.com.au forum, I found this article titled "Downlights fire warning" from Channel 7 Today Tonight web site talking about the danger of downlight setting fire to insulation in the roof.

There's even a video on the web site.


"Ceiling downlights are a serious fire risk thought to cause at least one home fire per week by igniting roof insulation. And because they burn in the roof cavities above fire alarms residents only know their house is burning when the ceiling collapses."

"Metropolitan Fire Brigade investigators Rod East and Colin Fowler say over the past 18 months, in Melbourne alone, more than 57 houses have been damaged or destroyed by a downlight fire."

"Electrician and Managing Director of A and F Electrical, Frank Spiteri, blames a "do it yourself" mentality sweeping across Australia, for an increasing number of dodgy installations."

I guess it could be caused by the downlights not been insulated/installed properly, or the insulation not been installed properly, or both.

If you have downlights in your house, you might want to get a licensed eletrician to check if it's correctly installed!

If you found any problem and looking for solution, thanks to Mark/Cookiemonster from homeone.com.au forum, the following 2 products would certainly help:

(1)Isolite - Downlight Guard 94-114 for $14.95 each.




(2)Isolite Transformer Isolator for $9.95 each.

[Tips.005] Check the location of your external lights

I learned this from another customer of our builde near Regents Park.

They have a neighbour just built with ******* Home, and high up under the eaves outside of Main bedroom on first floor, there was a sensor light installed. The idea was to put it high up there so that the area it can detect movements (and turn on the light) will be larger.

After they moved in, and electricity connected, they found that it's giving too many false alarms as the sensor picks up lots of activities from the neighbour's back yard as well. They tried to adjust the sensor and guess what, they can't reach it any more as it's too high and they have to pay someone with really long ladder just to adjust the sensor's covering angle. Of course the other option is to turn it off, but since you already paid the money for that, why border switching it off?

The lesson/tip is, if you are planning for external lights, make sure it's within reachable height.