Industrial Pendant Light Tutorial

Today I'm going to take you step by step through the process of making an industrial style pendant light.

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You will need a brooding lamp, a pendant light kit, a screwdriver, adhesive, primer, and spray paint.  Home Depot carries a 3 pack of pendant lights made by Commercial Electric.  I have found that this particular pack gives me the best results and is cheaper.  You can purchase a generic no frills light kit for about $15, but using this pack each light kit is about $13.

Step 1:

Set everything aside except your brooding lamp.  Remove the plastic zip tie that is keeping everything together.

Step 2:
Remove the electrical cord from the lamp shade by unscrewing the ceramic ring from the ceramic casing and then removing the gold and silver screws from the wire leads.

You are through with the power cord for this project.  To keep everything together and ready for a future project reattach the leads to the ceramic cylinder and then screw the ceramic cylinder into the ceramic ring.  You should be left with just your brooding lamp shade.

Step 3:

Take out one of the pendant light kits.

Step 4:

We will use everything from this kit except the lamp shade, so remove it by unscrewing the plastic ring on the inside of the shade.

Step 5:

Now we need to remove the electrical cord.  Make sure you carefully document the order you remove things because you will need to put everything back in reverse order a little later on.

Start by removing the mounting bracket on the ceiling plate.  To do this simply unscrew the two screw covers on the front of the plate.

Next remove the wire lock using a small screw driver.

Slide off the metal sheath.

Remove the decorative ball.  This little ball has a threaded sheath in it which will thread into the sheath once the lamp is put together.  Sometimes it can be too tight to remove by hand.  If this is the case wrap the decorative ball with a towel and gently, but firmly, use a wrench to loosen the ball.  Once it is loose you can finish by hand.  There are actually two threaded sheaths in this section.  One needs to remain with the ball and the other is attached to the ceramic end of the cord.

Slide the bell off the cord.  Here's what you will have once everything has been removed.

Step 6:

Now you need to attach the bell from the light kit to the brooding lamp.  To do this you need to carefully apply your adhesive to the bottom edge of the bell and glue it to the top of the brooding lamp. Make sure you follow the instructions of your adhesive and watch for expansion.  Wipe off any excess glue with a damp rag.  I used the Gorilla Glue Precision Glue Pen.

Step 7:

Prime and spray paint your lamp shade, the little ball, the metal sheath, the little screw covers, and your ceiling plate.  I chose to paint the inside of the shade white and the outside purple.  If you choose to use a different color on the inside than on the outside make sure paint the inside first.  When you paint the outside make sure that the shade is setting on a completely flat surface.

Step 8:

Assemble the lamp.  Start by threading the electric cord through the lamp shade.  Secure the cord with the little ball.

Slide the sheath back on and screw into place.

Slide the wire through the ceiling plate and then slide on the wire lock.  This lock will tighten against the wire so that your lamp can hang your desired length.

 Slide the hanging bracket into place and attach using the screw covers.

Now your lamp is ready to be hung.  These are the lights hanging in my scrap nook.

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