Sensor/timer-based outdoor festoon lights

[Zudecke]

Hi guys,

We have some festoon lights in our garden which we really love.

Unfortunately, in the absence of outdoor power, they trail wedged under a patio door and across our floor to reach the power point. The key thing to note though is that they are connected via a smart plug, which turns the lights on/off according to a schedule.

Our electrician is planning to route power from internal sockets and create an outdoor socket for the lights (and anything else) to connect to. That's great, but we are unclear how we can continue to have the lights either on a timer or hooked into the wifi (a la smart plug) as the smart plugs appear t protrude too much and wouldn't fit in the waterproof housing of the external socket.

Any ideas on how we can get these on a timer or ambience sensor?

Thanks,

Z

[kellys_eye]

You can get weather/waterproof boxes to house extension blocks, power adapters etc from many garden/pond supply businesses. These boxes (often green in colour) have sealed cable entry/exits and enough space to house all those 'wall wart' type power supplies and timers. We use one at our (outside) fish tank, fed from a standard 13A plug extension connected to an RCD external socket.

He's a typical example form the first search result https://www.amazon.co.uk/Masterplug-WBX ... B0062GTL42

[arco_iris]

Also available are outdoor weather timer sockets which accept a conventional 13A plug (if your lights are 240v) obviously this won't accommodate a PSU if they are 12v, in which case see above.

61ARtaPcUGL._AC_SL1077_.jpg (54.84 KiB) Viewed 1760 times

This one is BG, other makes exist.

[Zudecke]

Interesting idea, thank you! They do seem quite big, but seems like a very good solution!

[ericmark]

WiFi sockets will fit in standard sized socket boxes, so could easy fit a WiFi socket.

However I have had my WiFi sockets go faulty, so would say likely better to have outside socket powered from an indoors socket, so like an extension lead perment fixed.

This means if water ever gets into outside socket easy to isolate, and you can still use plug in wifi sockets.

[Zudecke]

WiFi sockets will fit in standard sized socket boxes, so could easy fit a WiFi socket.

However I have had my WiFi sockets go faulty, so would say likely better to have outside socket powered from an indoors socket, so like an extension lead perment fixed.

This means if water ever gets into outside socket easy to isolate, and you can still use plug in wifi sockets.

Just so we're on the same page, what do you mean when you say WiFi socket?

8 meant the WiFi adapter plug things which I've got all over - I. E. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B082DYJF52/ ... HBQBWKCVXM

So I'd plug the lights into this in the outside socket and then can control them via WiFi.

This is what I'm suspecting won't fit inside the external outdoor socket box...

[Neelix]

BG do a large outdoor socket that might fit the bill

https://www.sparkswarehouse.com/product ... SrEALw_wcB

[ericmark]

I have these sockets which are not the best

socket-eg.jpg (26.99 KiB) Viewed 1709 times

the same firm also do plug in adaptors,

MiHome-range.jpg (106.55 KiB) Viewed 1709 times

and the main reason I use them is historic, they were used in mothers house and I brought them to this house.

My son had said how good Nest thermostats were, and the Energenie TRV heads were claimed to work with Nest wall thermostats, in fact they don't. Support was withdrawn. So I have the following

Mihome-used.jpg (226.08 KiB) Viewed 1709 times

and four have been removed, likely cross interference, but still a pain to replace light switches and sockets.