Landscape Lighting in Rohnert Park & Sonoma County
Real voltage-drop math and system sizing — not just fixtures stuck in the ground — from a licensed local electrical contractor.
Why Sonoma County Homes & Businesses Call Bright Right First
- We size your transformer and wire gauge with real math — not guesswork that leaves your far fixtures dim.
- We explain voltage drop honestly, so your system stays bright everywhere, not just near the transformer.
- Licensed, insured, and available 24/7 — call (707) 791-5552 any time your project needs an electrician on-site.
★★★★★
5.0 · 27 Google reviews
20+ years
in the trade
CSLB #1156335
licensed · bonded · insured
Sonoma County
owned & operated
Landscape Lighting
Why Sonoma County Chooses Bright Right
- Local, family-owned electrical contractor based right in Rohnert Park — not a call center routing you to a subcontractor.
- Straightforward answers on system sizing and cost, explained before you sign anything.
- CSLB-licensed (#1156335) and available around the clock for anything that comes up along the way.
Landscape Lighting
What Is Landscape Lighting?
Landscape lighting covers designing and installing the low-voltage electrical system that powers exterior fixtures throughout your yard — path lights, tree uplights, and accent fixtures highlighting your home's landscaping. Most residential systems run on 12-volt low-voltage power, stepped down from your home's line voltage through a transformer. The real skill here isn't just placing fixtures — it's sizing the transformer and wiring correctly so every fixture, even the ones farthest from the transformer, stays reliably bright for years.
This is different from accent lighting, which covers the placement techniques (uplighting, wall washing, spotlighting) you might use with landscape fixtures — this page focuses on the electrical system itself. Bright Right Electric installs landscape lighting for homeowners across Sonoma County, as a CSLB-licensed electrical contractor (#1156335) based right in Rohnert Park.
Landscape Lighting
Our Process
A landscape lighting installation moves through the same core stages:
01
Layout Planning
We walk your property and plan fixture placement, run lengths, and total load.
02
Transformer Sizing
We calculate the right transformer capacity based on your total fixture wattage, with headroom for future additions.
03
Wire Gauge & Layout Selection
We choose the right wire gauge and wiring topology (daisy-chain, hub, or loop) for each run's length and load.
04
Installation
We run direct-burial cable, mount the transformer, and install and aim each fixture.
05
Voltage Testing
We test voltage at each fixture to confirm it's within the safe range, not just that the light turns on.
06
Final Walkthrough
We walk you through the system, including any timer or photocell controls.
Landscape Lighting
How Much Does Landscape Lighting Cost?
Cost depends on the number of fixtures, total wire run length, and transformer capacity your property needs — a small front-yard path lighting project costs less than a full-property system with tree uplighting, accent fixtures, and multiple wire runs.
Landscape Lighting
Understanding Voltage Drop
This is the single most important concept behind a landscape lighting system that stays reliably bright: voltage drop. As electrical current travels along a wire, resistance gradually reduces the voltage reaching each fixture. A common design guideline recommends keeping voltage at every fixture within 10% of the transformer's rated output — for a 12-volt system, that means no fixture should receive less than about 10.8 volts. A fixture at the end of an undersized or overly long run can dim noticeably, flicker, or fail to turn on at all — a genuinely common issue in DIY installs where long runs weren't properly accounted for.
Landscape Lighting
Sizing Your Transformer
A reliable, real formula: add up the total wattage of all connected fixtures, multiply by 1.2 for a 20% safety buffer, then round up to the next standard transformer size.
| Standard Transformer Sizes | Typical Fit |
|---|---|
| 100–150W | Small front yard or path lighting project |
| 200–300W | Mid-size yard with multiple zones |
| 600–1200W | Larger properties or multi-zone systems |
*Example: 10 fixtures at 5 watts each totals 50 watts. Multiplied by 1.2, that's 60 watts — a 100-watt transformer comfortably covers the load.
Choosing the Right Wire Gauge
Wire gauge needs to match your run length and total load — here's a general guideline:
| Wire Gauge | Typical Run Length | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| 16 AWG | Up to ~80 ft | Shorter runs, lower total wattage |
| 14 AWG | Up to ~120 ft | Moderate runs and wattage |
| 12 AWG or heavier | 100+ ft / higher loads | Longer runs, larger installations |
When in doubt, going one gauge heavier is inexpensive insurance against a dim, disappointing system.
Landscape Lighting
Wiring Layout: Daisy-Chain vs. Hub vs. Loop
How the wire is routed matters as much as its gauge:
- Daisy-chain — the simplest layout, but voltage drops steadily down the line. Fine for short runs with just a few fixtures.
- Hub/tee method — wire branches out to small clusters, evening out the distance from the transformer to each fixture.
- Loop method — the run returns to the transformer, feeding fixtures from both directions and cutting end-of-run voltage drop.
For longer runs or fixture-heavy designs, hub and loop layouts hold voltage far better than one long daisy-chain — worth discussing for larger properties.
Planning for Future Growth
If you might add fixtures down the road, it's worth sizing up your transformer by one tier now — a larger unit typically costs less upfront than replacing an undersized one later once your system has grown beyond its original capacity.
Landscape Lighting
What's Included
Landscape lighting often works alongside these related services, each with its own dedicated page for more detail:
Accent Lighting
Accent lighting covers the placement techniques — uplighting, wall washing, spotlighting — you can use with your landscape fixtures once the electrical system is in place.
Outdoor Lighting and Power
Outdoor lighting and power covers the broader exterior electrical infrastructure beyond low-voltage landscape systems, including line-voltage circuits for porches and patios.
Flood Light Installation
Flood light installation covers high-lumen exterior fixtures for driveways and large areas, a different fixture category from landscape lighting's lower-voltage accent approach.
Security Lighting
Security lighting covers exterior lighting specifically for deterrence and visibility, worth considering alongside a landscape lighting system's aesthetic fixtures.
LED Lighting Retrofits
LED lighting retrofits cover converting older halogen or incandescent landscape fixtures to energy-efficient LED, often reducing your system's total load and energy cost.
Lighting Repair
Lighting repair covers diagnosing and fixing dim, flickering, or non-functioning landscape fixtures, often tracing the issue back to voltage drop or a wiring problem.
Landscape Lighting
Why Sonoma County Chooses Bright Right Electric
We size the system with real math, not a guess.
Transformer capacity, wire gauge, and wiring layout all get calculated for your specific property — not eyeballed.
We explain voltage drop before it becomes your problem.
A system that looks bright on day one but dims at the far end within a year is a planning failure — we design to avoid that from the start.
We plan for growth, not just today's fixture count.
If you might expand your system later, we'll tell you honestly whether it's worth sizing up now.
We're licensed, insured, and available 24/7.
As a CSLB-licensed contractor (#1156335), we're reachable at (707) 791-5552 any time your project needs an electrician on-site.
08 ─────── Reviews
What Rohnert Park Customers Are Saying
"This is the most professional company I have ever worked with. I am a difficult person and hard to please (I have really high standards (as a retired science teacher) and I am skeptical of workmen and I'm a perfectionist!). Bright Right is currently working on the 3rd job I have hired them for – everything has gone smoothly, no stress at all!!! They are so friendly and so courteous. Rick and Dustin are an effective team with their two unique personalities – both very upbeat, serious, and kind. They explain everything in detail and answer all my questions (I am hyper-concerned about my property), and they are basically experienced, conscientious electricians you can trust."
— Nora Parker · Google Review
"I recently hired Dustin for some electrical work at my home, and I couldn't be happier with the results. He installed a high-quality bathroom fan, finished installing several outlets around the house, and completed a new electrical panel installation. From start to finish, Dustin was professional, knowledgeable, and clearly takes pride in doing the job right. The new panel installation was the bigger job, and Dustin handled it with real expertise. Everything was organized, labeled, and done to a very high standard, which gave me a lot of confidence in the safety and quality of the work."
— Google Review
"Bright Right did the electrical for our kitchen remodel and we couldn't be happier, we have since then added an EV with them and they were as good as the first time. Highly recommend!"
— Joey Evans · Google Review
"Shout out to Dustin Fildes, the electrician they sent to do the work at my house. You can tell he takes pride in his work. He's a very professional and very friendly. Individual would absolutely recommend Bright Right Electric and specifically Dustin to all my family and friends. Thank you Bright Right"
— Robert Horner, Google Review
Google Business Profile
5.0
Across 27 Google reviews
Landscape Lighting
Serving Sonoma County Homes & Businesses
Bright Right Electric is based at 1150 Holly Ave in Rohnert Park, and we install accent lighting for homes and businesses throughout Sonoma County — from Rohnert Park and Santa Rosa to Petaluma and the surrounding communities along the Highway 101 corridor. Whatever feature you want highlighted, we bring the right technique to the job.
Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Why are my landscape lights dim at the end of the run?
This is a classic sign of voltage drop, where resistance along a wire gradually reduces the voltage reaching each fixture. A common guideline recommends keeping voltage at each fixture within 10% of the transformer's rated output — for a 12V system, no fixture should get less than about 10.8V.
What size transformer do I need for landscape lighting?
Add up your fixtures' total wattage, multiply by 1.2 for a safety buffer, then round up to the next standard transformer size — common sizes include 100, 150, 200, 300, 600, 900, and 1200 watts.
What wire gauge should I use for landscape lighting?
It depends on run length and total wattage. As a general guideline, 16 AWG works for shorter runs up to about 80 feet, 14 AWG suits runs up to roughly 120 feet, and 12 AWG or heavier handles longer runs or higher loads.
What is voltage drop in landscape lighting?
Voltage drop is the gradual reduction in voltage as electrical current travels along a wire due to resistance. It's the most common cause of dim or flickering fixtures, especially toward the end of a long wire run.
How much does landscape lighting installation cost?
Cost depends on the number of fixtures, wire run lengths, and transformer capacity your property needs — a small path-lighting project costs less than a full-property system with multiple zones.
Daisy-chain vs. loop wiring — which is better for landscape lighting?
Daisy-chain is simpler but loses more voltage toward the end of the run, making it fine for short runs with few fixtures. A loop layout feeds fixtures from both directions, reducing end-of-run voltage drop — better for larger, fixture-heavy systems.
Can I add more lights to my existing landscape lighting system?
It depends on your transformer's remaining capacity and whether your existing wire runs can handle the added load without excessive voltage drop. Sizing a system with some extra headroom from the start makes future expansion easier.
How many landscape lights can one transformer power?
It depends on the transformer's wattage rating and each fixture's wattage — divide the transformer's capacity (with a safety buffer) by your fixtures' typical wattage to estimate how many it can support.
Is landscape lighting low voltage or line voltage?
Most residential landscape lighting runs on low voltage, typically 12 volts, stepped down from standard household line voltage through a transformer — this makes it safer to work with than full line-voltage circuits.
Can I install landscape lighting myself?
Low-voltage systems are safer to handle than line-voltage electrical work, but proper transformer sizing, wire gauge selection, and voltage-drop planning are real technical considerations that determine whether your system stays reliably bright for years.
Get in touch
Ready to Talk Through Your Project?
Call (707) 791-5552 or fill out the form below and we'll follow up with real design guidance for whatever you want to highlight.
Phone
(707) 791-5552
(tap to call)
Address
1150 Holly Ave, Rohnert Park, CA 94928
Hours
7am - 5pm & 24 hour emergency services available.
15 ─────── Full service detail
Electrical Panel Upgrades in Rohnert Park
Replacing an undersized or obsolete panel is the most common job we perform in Rohnert Park, and it's the one that unlocks everything else. If your home still runs original 100-amp service, a Federal Pacific Stab-Lok, or a Zinsco panel, you're working with equipment engineered for a much smaller electrical load — and, in the case of those two brands, with a documented history of breakers that fail to trip. Upgrading to 200-amp service makes EV charging, battery backup, heat pumps, and modern appliance loads possible without constantly tripping breakers. We size the new service to what your household actually needs, pull the permit, coordinate the PG&E disconnect and reconnect, and meet the inspector for final sign-off.
EV Charger Installation in Sonoma County
Bright Right installs Level 2 home charging sized to your vehicle and, just as importantly, to your panel's actual available capacity. We run the dedicated 240-volt circuit, mount and commission the charger, and handle the permit — installing Tesla Wall Connectors, universal J1772 and NACS units, and hardwired or plug-in setups across Rohnert Park, Petaluma, and Santa Rosa. The detail most homeowners don't hear until it's too late is that many Sonoma County panels can't support a Level 2 charger without a service upgrade first, so we run a load calculation before you buy equipment, not after. We can also pre-wire a second circuit if a second EV is anywhere in your future.
Standby Generators & Backup Power
Public safety power shutoffs are a fact of life in Sonoma County, and so are winter storms that take lines down in the hills. We install whole-house standby generators with automatic transfer switches that pick up the house within seconds of an outage, wire inlets and manual transfer switches for portable generators, and add whole-house surge protection so your equipment isn't damaged when the utility comes back online. We'll also tell you honestly which tier makes sense — not every home in Cotati or Penngrove needs a whole-house unit when a critical-loads panel that keeps the refrigerator, well pump, internet, and a few circuits alive costs a fraction as much.
Solar & Battery Systems
We handle new photovoltaic installation, battery storage, system additions, and remove-and-replace work when a roof needs attention or a system has failed — plus service on existing arrays that aren't producing what they should. If you inherited a solar system with the house and nobody can tell you how it's wired or whether it's still under warranty, we can assess it and give you a clear picture. Battery storage in particular has changed the math for Sonoma County homeowners: between shifting utility rate structures under NEM 3.0 and the frequency of outages, a battery paired with existing solar is often a better investment than adding more panels.
Interior & Exterior Lighting
Recessed and can lighting, full LED retrofits, under-cabinet lighting, dimmer and smart-switch installation, fixture and chandelier hanging, landscape lighting, and security and motion-sensor lighting for homes across Rohnert Park and the University District. On the commercial side we handle lighting retrofits for offices, retail spaces, and warehouses along the Commerce Boulevard corridor, including the fixture and control changes that come with California Title 24 compliance. Lighting is one of the few electrical upgrades where the difference is immediately visible, and it's frequently the cheapest way to make a dated room feel finished.
Electrical Troubleshooting & Repair
Breakers that trip for no obvious reason, circuits that go dead, lights that flicker when the dryer starts, outlets that no longer hold a plug, GFCIs that won't reset, a faint burning smell you can't locate. These are the calls where experience shows. We trace a fault to its real source instead of swapping parts and billing for guesses, which is why our repairs hold and why we get called in behind other contractors who couldn't find the problem. In older Sonoma County homes the cause is often a failing backstab connection, a corroded neutral, a rodent-damaged run in a crawlspace, or a decades-old junction box buried behind drywall.
Custom Homes & New Construction
Full electrical for ground-up residential builds, major remodels, and additions throughout Sonoma, Marin, and Napa County — load calculations and plan review, service and meter setup, rough-in, trim, and final inspection. We work with general contractors, designers, and owner-builders, and we're comfortable on high-end custom projects near Sonoma State University where the lighting design, low-voltage layout, and smart controls all have to be coordinated before a single wire goes in. Getting the details right at rough-in is what keeps a home safe and functional for the next forty years — and it's far cheaper than fixing it after the drywall is up.
Commercial Electrical & Tenant Improvement
Service upgrades, panel and subpanel work, dedicated circuits for equipment, lighting retrofits, EV charging for employee and customer parking, and full tenant-improvement electrical for offices, retail, restaurants, and light industrial space along Redwood Drive and beyond. We understand a commercial job runs on someone else's schedule, so we work around business hours when the scope requires it. From a single dedicated circuit to a complete build-out, you get one licensed contractor coordinating permits, PG&E, and inspection — with clear pricing and a clean, code-compliant result.