The pendant lights of the 1990s have given way to the latest trend of installing chandeliers. No longer are chandeliers only found in mansions and castles. There are hundreds of styles to fit every budget and every household. A chandelier can add so much to the overall look of a room, and with all of the light it gives out, it puts a whole new perspective on your home.
If you are replacing an existing fixture, the job of hanging your new chandelier should be fairly easy. Of course, if the existing junction box isn’t where you want it to be, then you’ll need to employ a professional electrician to install the correct wiring for you. Otherwise, it’s a fairly simple procedure to hang your own fixture.
A dining room chandelier needs to be in the center of the room as well as the table. If you don’t have a formal dining room, then center the light above the table. Never buy a chandelier that is wider than your table, because people standing up from the table might end up bumping their heads.
If your ceilings are a standard 8’, hang the chandelier about 30 – 34” over the table. For higher ceilings you need to add an extra 3” for each additional foot of ceiling. Since chandeliers can be heavy, you need to make sure you have a heavy-duty junction box to hang it from. You can buy these from local home improvement or hardware stores to replace your existing one if necessary. The mounting strap and threaded tube that come with the fixture are then screwed onto the junction box, and the grounding wire should be attached to the green screw on the strap.
To get the fixture itself ready to go, you need to decide how long you want the chain to be. If it is too long, it may be necessary to take out some links. If the chain isn’t too heavy this can be done by inserting two screwdrivers into a link and twisting them opposite directions to bend them. Once the chain is the length you want it to be, thread the wire from the chandelier through the chain going through every other link.
At the end of the chain, you will thread the end of the wire through the hanging loop and then through the ceiling mount (canopy). Thread the lamp cord through the threaded tube up into the box and back down before making your connections. You will twist each chandelier wire around the corresponding supply wire from the junction box and connect them with a yellow wire connector. Your wires won’t be black and white so that you can tell neutral from hot. Instead, the neutral wire will have a ridge on it.
Now all you have to do is mount the canopy to the ceiling and thread the hanging loop on the threaded tube. One thing to note here is that if you aren’t going to be placing a table under the new chandelier right away, you need to put something else there in order to keep people from banging their hands running into the low-hanging fixture.
There’s nothing left to do at this point but to sit back and enjoy your lovely new chandelier, and you did it all yourself. Don’t be surprised if you hear, “Honey, I want you to do something for me. You know that old light fixture in our bedroom…”
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