The intention of this guide is to present you how to splice into your exiting light cable above ground. If you are in a situation where you have to move the power source to your pool light and the light cord will not reach to the new location, you have two options. You could buy a whole new light fixture with a longer cord or you could splice into the existing cord and add to it. If you add a spliced cord, you should not put the splice underground inside the light wire's conduit. That pipe generally collects water and the spice would eventually short out. The splice should be made above ground.
1. REVIEW THE PROBLEM - A typical situation might be that you want to build on the back-end of your house and have to move the power supply to a point further away from the pool. As A result the pool light cable is too short to reach to the new location. You need to add length to the cable.
2. TURN OFF POWER TO LIGHT - Turn off the power to your pool light at the breaker box.
3. DETERMINE CABLE LOCATION - Dig around the base of the conduit below the power box near the house to see what direction the light conduit is going to the pool. Lay out a hose from that point to the pool edge straight off the light fixture to estimate where cable is buried.
4. LOCATE A SPLICE POINT - Pick a point along the conduit (hose) where you can place a 2' post that wont interfered with other traffic. The best option may be just outside where you are building an extension. Check to see if the conduit is there. You might have to dig carefully on either side of the hose to find the conduit.
5. DIG DOWN TO THE CABLE CONDUIT - At the desired slice point, dig down and uncover about 4' of the conduit.
6. CUT CONDUIT - You are going to need to bring up about 3' of light cable to junction box. Cut the conduit on the light side of the conduit. Be careful not to cut into the wire cable inside the conduit. You might use a hack saw here to better control the cut. Cut just down to where the saw gets through the conduit. Make several of these shallow cuts around the outside of the conduit until the conduit breaks off. DO NOT CUT THROUGH THE WIRE CABLE.
7. CUT THE CONDUIT/CABLE - Make another cut in the conduit about 3' from the first cut towards the house. This time you wanT to cut all the way through - conduit and wire cable. I used a PVC pipe cutter to cut the conduit and a pair of large pliers to cut through the cable.
8. BEND CUT CONDUIT SECTION UP - With the one end of the conduit and cable cut through and the other end of the conduit cut 3', bend the conduit/cable straight up.
9. PULL 3' SECTION OF CONDUIT OFF WIRE - Pull the cut portion of the conduit off the wire. Check that the wire was not cut at the bend.
10. SET A POST - Bury the end of a 4' landscape post into the ground about 2' next to the bend of the cable.
11. RE-TRENCH LINE TO NEW POWER BOX - Dig a new trench from the splice point to the base of the new power box. Lay in new conduit and wire.
12. RE-ATTACH WIRES TO POWER BOX - Connect the new wire to the new power box.
13. REVIEW JUNCTION BOX PARTS - This picture shows the junction box, its cover and one of the 90° conduit connectors.
14. EXTEND CONDUIT 2' UP POST - Using the 90° conduit connectors, and 2' lengths of conduit, bend the conduit and wire up the post.
15. MOUNT JUNCTION BOX - Fit the bottom of the junction box over the upright conduits and secure the box to the post. Take about 5" off the two ends of the cable casing and strip the ends of the four insulated wires.
16. JOIN WIRES IN JUNCTION BOX - Join the threes sets of wires - white to white, black to black and ground to ground - with wire nuts. Push the extra wire inside the box.
17. COVER JUNCTION BOX - Screw the waterproof cover onto the face of the junction box.
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