My walk to Home Depot yesterday afternoon consisted in purchasing two things: an electric tester thingy and a new security light. At this point I'm fairly confident the problem is with the light sensor, based on reviews and the fact that they sell the light sensors separately for replacement purposes. (Since I wasn't sure of the brand of my fixture, and it wasn't that much less than a whole new fixture, I bought the brand that had the replacement sensor, so in the future I can replace it myself. I bought the light in hopes that I could return it if the sensor proved that the problem was the wiring.)
See? New toy!
Yay! Now I can test electricity when needed. I first went out and tested the wire from the source box to the light box. There was electricity a-flowing. I then went and turned off the breaker (and confirmed no electricity), and took the old fixture off of the garage, leaving the wires connected. I went back in and turned on the power, and tested the fixture wires. Power was flowing through them, eliminating the idea that there was a wiring problem. Drat.
So, I turned off the power again, took off the old fixture entirely, and got out the new light fixture.
There's all the parts of my light. I didn't need to use some of them, because I could re-use the old light's pieces, saving me some time.
I then installed the new light.
I was a bit concerned, because while it was pretty awesome that there was light right away, it was worrisome because the setting was on "test" initially, and the lights came on as soon as I screwed in the bulbs (part of the instructions had me turning the power back on before screwing in the bulbs for reasons that probably made/make sense, but I don't recall them right now). And then when I flipped the settings to a more reasonable light setting, the lights didn't turn off. Erm, that's going to waste bulbs. But the lights did eventually turn off (as evidenced by them not being on in the picture.
I have a problem with the lights, though. You can't adjust up and down. When I got home tonight, I was excited for the light, but the light facing the driveway blinded me, too. On the other hand, my entire backyard was lit very brightly by the other light, and the light does brightly shine down the driveway. My biggest concern is that the houses in this neighborhood are very close together, so I'm hoping that the lights aren't annoying my neighbors! I hope they let me know if they are annoying, so I can try to figure out a way to adjust them. But...I had light when I came home! I could park in my garage without being too frightened by the darkness!
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