today we're looking at wide rocker switches from hamilton litestat
i'll try not to make you cry during this one gordon
is that your installation work well we'll see in a while what's behind that uh wide rocker switch
as well gary apparently this is on trend now so hamilton have decided to roll it across their
decorative range but already incredibly popular in hotel projects and different parts of the world
there was a preference for a wide rocker right okay and grab the one on the end then so let's
take a look because i've been playing around with these and these are really tactile i really like
them yeah very easy to operate and yet a good positive switch action on there nice it is turn
it over yeah okay so obviously that's the bit the electrician's really interested and obviously i've
been away and i've been connecting these up and there's some great features also on the back here
so let me show you the full install but i'll show you the key points the termination holes are huge
i've got three doubled over cables here so feed in feed out and the feed up to the lighting point
itself and when i back it off gordon the screw it gets stiff at the point that i'm fully opened
yeah right yes you're not going to risk yeah that screw dropping out onto the floor no and they've
identified form it's a two-way switch being used as a one-way they've actually identified
the terminal in the switch that is for the one way as well so there's no guessing for the electrician
yeah that's good handy feature yeah it is so tighten this um back in you know we've talked
there and they've gone in no problem did you see me struggling for those three doubled over cables
not at all trim itself you could leave it on if you want but if you happen to take it off as i
did here it says top so how about that's going to see how to get it on yeah yeah so just that that
trim is useful when you obviously when you've got damp uh plaster surface or recently wallpapered
or something like that it obviously prevents some corrosion problems uh over the longer term okay so
we wind back our screws because obviously we're gonna have a screwless front to this and there
is something very satisfying about clipping into place once you've leveled up your box
clipping into place the front antique brass in this case plate yeah there's something about
the hamilton plates are very easy to clip on and remove which is something we have struggled with
under the ones in the past you end up nearly wrenching the switch off the wall to get the
decorative plate off and there it is i've just clipped that back into position lovely so this
one i've left the trim plate on so you can see it there left it on again it says top again so you
get it round the right way it says actually top on the switch as well as the back plate screwing
it back into position again and leveling it up and again that satisfying feeling of inserting
yeah yeah just got your finger prints to wipe off there now gary well gary made that look easy yeah
believe it or not i am electrician gordon okay and i like features that make electrician's life
easier and if you look at that one gang two-way switch clearly identified the one-way element as
well as it did on the two gang and the three gang switches making it so much easier when
you've got it on the wall that you aren't going to go back after testing to rotate it round or move
a conductor over i like that sounds like you've made a few mistakes in the past for that gary yeah
that's from personal experience i would suggest there yeah yeah so obviously from an electrician's
point of view fantastic now when it comes to finishes that's normally a customer choice and
they probably may not pay much attention to actually how easy it is for you to install them
but there is a fantastic range of finishers and we'll just have a little closer look at some of
the ones we've got here so let's have a look at some of the hamilton range that we've got
here start with our favorite finish it's very on trend at the minute it's the antique brass
which again is a single rocker and a black plastic trim around that rocker switch next
up we've got a satin brass front three individual rockers and a white plastic trim but there's also
an accessory for that to give you that rope edge finish we'll come back to that in a while
and next up we've got a polished brass again black insert around there for the plastic and dual gang
switching option and some other popular finishes we've got a bright chrome dual gang one here with
obviously the wide rocket and a quartz gray insert around there and rounding off with our satin steel
again single gang with a white insert around the rocker as well so we've just shown you just a
small selection of the range of finishes available from hamilton check out the video we made on the
heartland range joel goes into more details up to more finishes and obviously products that
complement the rocker switches the sockets and some of the other control elements in there but on
trend gary you got excited when you saw this a raw page yeah it takes me back to 1980 and i'd say to
you gordon relax don't do it however this could be coming up in places like public houses you
know that quaint little village pub it's got the toby jugs on the shelf it's got brass horseshoes
and then that's where it's going to sit i would suggest that this type of accessory would sit here
however it's more popular elsewhere in the world yeah still probably yeah so again yeah we have our
current on trend finishes obviously different parts of the world and hamilton service these
projects worldwide particularly things like hotels then possibly the the rope edge brass lives on in
some some modern day installations but just to say it won't make a massive revival in 2021 i
would suggest yeah so one good little feature obviously i showed getting the place plates
on and off is incredibly easy with hamilton range there is one little detail to look at yeah a tiny
little insert there to get your screwdriver in when you need to remove the plate so just yeah
that's a key bit to remember and again that that plastic trim to help with the installation as well
right okay so that's taking it through there we've looked at the finishes now when i picked them up
i've got obviously another reason why a switch mechanism that's larger and easier to operate is
such a benefit to me now personally so in the last 12 months unfortunately and you're fully aware of
this my daughter had a tragic accident that meant her predominant arm was taken away from about the
middle of here away from her so having a switch that's easy to operate maybe with a different part
of the body maybe an elbow or maybe the end of her arm is obviously a massive benefit to us now
i'm sure that wasn't necessarily the first design feature that i thought but it was the first thing
when i picked it up i thought wow what a lovely easy mechanism and how large the switches were
to make it easier for my daughter however i'm sure somebody's going to say why can't you use
her of her hand i totally agree with that and she would more often than not she walks into a room
she opens the door she's only got one hand she's got a cup of tea a can of coke etc the likelihood
she'll be using an elbow or part of her arm in order to operate the switches so i thought that
was wonderful look at that switch that's perfect for the scenario that my daughter's going to find
as she moves through her life yeah and that's you know none of us are all getting any younger
and obviously people talk about part m and accessible buildings and things like that and
obviously you know we're not going to get into that there because that's an extensive document
but whatever you can do to make people's lives easier you know especially yeah as gary gets
older he's going to need those wide rocker switches as well but with high-end design i
would suggest these are beautiful switches and the range is massive isn't it i doubt there's anything
out there that they're already producing in the hamilton range but as always we're interested
in your feedback have you been fitting these switches by hamilton is there a hidden gem and
you would like to add it into the actual comments itself if there is please leave those if someone's
in the comments asking about the range and you know the answer could you help them out you know
it will save us a few comments as well which we really like as always we're interested in all of
those comments we'd like you to leave them below and we'll try and get back to as many as we can