too many wires???

Someone has used a wrong cable or not marked a switchwire with a brown wire. One pair of wires goes to the switch and should have 2 brown cores and an earth. Alternatively, a brown/blue pair could be used with a brown sleeve/marker on the blue to indicate switchwire. If you cannot identify this yourself, best call a professional. Moral of the story - mark/identify the connections before you disconnect the old light.

AndyJ
September 2009

I forgot to say... You don't have too many wires - you have the right amount - what you have is not enough connectors - you need four.

Earth
Permanent Live
Neutral
Switched Live (to turn the lamps on and off)

Your electrician will show you how to achieve this.

Good luck...

P
September 2009

You may do best to call an electrician...

The ceiling rose would have looked like this...

http://www.flameport.com/electric/lighting_circuits/lighting_ceiling_rose_looped.cs4

You do not connect permanent live to the lamps - just switched live - switched live often comes back from the switch on a BLUE wire (with a sleeve on it).

By twisting all the Blue wires together you have directly connected Live to Neutral with no lamp as a load - the fuse/breaker will complain about this whenever the light switch is on - when the switch is off the lamps will work until you turn them on - then they'll all go off.

Remember Lord Finchley and take care...

Lord Finchley tried to mend the Electric Light
Himself. It struck him dead: And serve him right!
It is the business of the wealthy man
To give employment to the artisan.

Peccavi
September 2009