DSF

As you may know I acquired a summer house and now wish to wire it up. I have had up in my loft for a while now a roll of 2 core, earth flat cable. I am wondering if this would be suitable, as in have regulations changed so much that this is now unsuitable. I am not going to hard wire the electrics to the mains myself but am willing to do the laying out and positioning of the sockets and lights.


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Current identification colours are brown blue now but ask your spark who will complete and sign off/register the work.

Mark

More important than the colour scheme would be the diameter of the cores as to how much current they can take.
Also, how the cable will be run and where - different regs for how the cable is secured/protected.
make a list of all the equipment you're going to have in there, along with how much power they pull, then work out how much of that equipment will ever be used at the same time. You can then work out the power usage, but for the cable rating, you also need to know the length of the run, so get a tape measure out and do that too.
or just get a spark in to do the job.

Yep colour is just tip of the iceberg lol, as said you need to talk to your spark first as they will self certify the work (if registered to do so) and notify building control.

These are helpful links for you:

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/permis ... electrics/
http://www.electricalcompetentperson.co ... -Explained

I am going to get a sparky in to price the whole lot anyway but as this cable is purely for the inside of the summer house for the lighting/power I was not sure.
I know we are not an electrical forum but thought I would ask the question anyway as they may be others out there thinking of doing something similar.

It's great to hear your plans to wire it up, be a great place when ready it's just that wiring regulations are particular even down to the colours used because new colour systems were introduced a while ago, blue/brown instead of black/Red so whilst it's most probably is useable the Spark may suggest you stick to current wiring colours for regulatory reasons otherwise they may for example have to identify the ends with the current colours which may cost more in time to do than you'd save in cost of the wire. Sounds a bit pedantic but ask any electrician about the regulations and they will probably be able to talk about the minor oddities all day long and there are different interpretation too. Look forward to hearing how it goes! and seeing some pictures erected and functioning!

Here is my erection!!!

I am 99 % sure that you can use any colour wire you like but it has to be marked up in the distribution board/fuse board as being so. If you have a reel of red/black twin and earth you might be better off flogging it on Ebay - very popular with people doing electrical work themselves that they don't want to have to get signed off - if its in the new colours then it has to be a new piece of wiring, if its in re/black it could have been there for donkeys years. Not that I am recommending that anyone should do such a thing as it would be clearly fraudulent and illegal ;o)

Your big expense might be the piece of armoured cable that you will need to run between your house and the new head quarters - the longer the run the bigger diameter of cable that you need so you don't suffer with voltage drop or over heating. If possible it would be a really good idea to run the cable back to your incoming fuseboard and put it on a circuit of its own.

Any sparky worthy of the name should be able to do this standing on his head. If you weren't so far away I could probably have kitted you out with enough MK 3 compartment dado to run all the way round the new HQ - so much more flexible than trunking and surface mount back boxes and easy to add extra sockets at a a later date if required.

When you calculate how many sockets you think you need - double it!

Exciting times to be had in Bookham!



Arthur

im at the same stage, been using extension leads for the last week but hopefully got a sparky coming soon to wire the summerhouse up, looking for Sockets, and 3 strip lighting...etc

had a 20 foot by 14 foot workshop wired recently..... 30 sockets and 12 4 foot tubes.