Outdoor light / two way hallway switch mystery

[SUNRAY]

The switches look fine to me. Why did you disconnect them?

Are you sure?

 

[hovertoast]

Cheers @SUNRAY, looks like we’re thinking along the same lines and you’ve added some clarifications.

Be interesting to see if we’re right. Still can’t work out why the first electrician couldn’t figure this out, it’s fairly straightforward (if indeed our assumptions are correct).

 

[SUNRAY]

Cheers @SUNRAY, looks like we’re thinking along the same lines and you’ve added some clarifications.

Be interesting to see if we’re right. Still can’t work out why the first electrician couldn’t figure this out, it’s fairly straightforward (if indeed our assumptions are correct).

Although it seems too easy for an 'electrician' to have got wrong.

 

[EFLImpudence]

Are you sure?

The wiring in this picture looks plausible - so maybe any errors were initially elsewhere.

 

[SUNRAY]

The wiring in this picture looks plausible - so maybe any errors were initially elsewhere.

View attachment 326198

At this point we can only make assumptions, however having read the comments and studied the excellent photo's, the wiring in this picture doesn't make sense to me within the whole picture as presented.
I trust my interpretation of this with neutral at the top, line at the bottom and the red on the left appearing to go nowhere looks plausible too.

And if my interpretation/assumption is correct, the proposal looks far more plausible.

The irony of course being the change at the switch would have only been swapping the red and brown wires and correcting at the ceiling fitting.

This is a simply a case of someone getting lost when making a change, presumably removing the original ceiling rose or very likely changing something prior to house move.

 

[EFLImpudence]

Surely, in that picture the Brown to COM with link to other switch L1 (of two-way circuit) must be the Line supply.

 

[SUNRAY]

Surely, in that picture the Brown to COM with link to other switch L1 (of two-way circuit) must be the Line supply.

Not if it is the cable going to the outside light, as mentioned

To the best of my knowledge it's the brown & blue wires in the first pic that are going to the outdoor light. Matches what's out there...

Although I accept at this point it is all assumptions/conjecture.

Bear in mind

I had an electrician come out in 2021 and he said that he couldn't get it working,

So we have no idea what mess was left with that meddling

However

There has been an occasional quirk over the past 18 months of the outdoor light coming on when the internal hallway light is switched on. When this happens there is a flickering and change of brightness on the hallway light...

seems to indicate to me the possibility that this may be due to the lights being wired in series, with symptoms I have encountered myself with LEDs in series. Such an arrangement fits perfectly with my assessment of the information presented before me, I started with studying the pictures and worked out the most likely original circuit, then worked out the most likely errors and solution, then studied this before making any comment:

...I would do the following up at the light.

Blue in with the neutrals
Yellow as the switch live for the ceiling light
Red as the permanent live for the switch

Then at the switch:

Yellow from the light in with the other yellow on the left hand switch
Red from the light in with the blue on the left hand switch
Blue from the light connected to the blue from the outside light (not needed anywhere else)
You then need a link between the two bottom connections on both switches to take the permanent live to the outside light switch.
Then connect the outside light live to either of the connections on the top of the right hand switch.

and it can be seen our offers were virtually Identical. (Actually I was going to leave yellow as 'L' and use red as 'SL' but very happily synchronised with the existing suggestion to avoid any confusion).

I agree wholeheartedly with this:

Edit: I’m also a little uncomfortable that the electrician you mentioned couldn’t figure this out as it’s pretty straightforward and makes me think I might be missing something.

We only have to look on YouTube at some of the people who think they are electricians and the appalling fault-finding skills they possess. I see what appears to be a very simple problem, time will tell If my assumptions are incorrect and if that is the case I'll happily work with OP as far as I'm able towards a solution.

 

[dmbeez]

@SUNRAY & @hovertoast thank you so much, your guidance did the trick! Greatly appreciated.

 

[hovertoast]

@dmbeez nice one. Thanks for coming back to let us know.

 

[SUNRAY]

So much for the performance of some electricians.

Well done and thanks for making it so easy for us with good pictures and descriptions.