I wired up a couple of pool lights yesterday. We’ve never had a swimming pool light before, and We’ve never really wanted one, but the new place came with a pool with a light (that didn’t work) and so when we resurfaced the pool, it just made sense to replace the aging, yellowing light fitting as well. That then meant that we needed to replace the transformer for the light as well, which I finally got round to doing yesterday.
It’s probably not a good idea to just have a bash at installing a pool light transformer when you’ve never done it before and there’s 50,000 litres of salty water full of people on the other end of the cable. That’s why I elicited the assistance of an electrician friend who came round and helped out for the price of a cup of coffee and a damn fine braai afterwards. Everyone’s a winner.
And then, as darkness fell the pool light revealed itself. So cool:
A bit like this, worryingly:
Yes, folks: “a classic example of Cherenkov radiation is the characteristic blue glow of an underwater nuclear reactor.”
Koeberg finally has a local rival. And were going to have no issues with loadshedding anymore. There may be other problems, but not having electricity won’t be one of them.
Honestly, I can’t see us using the pool light much. It’s a bit of a gimmick, but once we’re allowed to have people around again, it’ll be a very cool accompaniment to the party ambiance.
However, this pool light is going to get a lot of use:
This was another one that we wired in yesterday. The pool table was an impulsive Gumtree purchase. It used to be in a Stones bar somewhere (possibly this one?) before being refurbished by a guy who refurbishes pool tables. He needed to get rid of this one so he could use the space to refurbish his next pool table (a novelty L-shaped one, nogal!) and so added the very cool lights as a sweetener to the deal. I thought we’d put them up just to add to the look of the room which will eventually be our party/bar/entertainment room (yes, like the rest of the place, it needs a lot of work), but WOW – what a difference they made. You can even see the balls on the table now. No more excuses about weird shadows or dim corners. It’s pukka stuff.
I know that these are silly, nice-to-have things, but the work on this place will take many months – probably many years – and occasionally, we need to concentrate on more than just the essentials.
Right now though, it’s back to the rather more mundane jobs.