The lightpost-problem

It has started to be really quite dark around here now. Even after changing the clock, Maren drives to work in the darkness. Therefore it would be nice if our outside-lights worked. They used to work fine, untill a few weeks ago when switching them on caused the earth-switch to blow and left the whole house without power. Not ideal, so our solution untill now has been to simply not use the lightpost. Today I hoped I could perhaps fix the thing.

To be honest, I had never inspected this post up close ever since we moved in. It is apparent that the poor thing hasn`t had much love since it was planted, which I guess was in the '80s when the house was built. The light-fixtures themselves are in bad shape and could be taking in water. This is a nightmare to have to fix, so I hoped it would be something simpler, like a corroded connector block or something. Checkin this would involve opening the top of the post.

Unscrewing the two screws and having a quick peek would be simple, I thought. It was not. Both screws were rusted and stripped, and no screwdriver would take them out. I tried all the tricks, including grinding a new slot for a large flathead. After one screw head broke off from the torsion, I gave in and drilled out the screws. 

I am a bit afraid of this thing. The cheap cutting-discs I have explode way too often. Good to have eye-protection.

Succes! It took way longer than it should have to confirm that the inside of the post is fine and that I should not have bothered opening it up in the first place.... Unfortunately this might mean the post is not very fixable. If it needs replacing, I guess it can wait till next winter while we get by guessing where to back up the car in the morning.