Recessed meter box!?

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I'm moving soon but my next house doesn't have a gas supply, which I can't live without, so I've decided to get gas installed. The National Grid however, will install anything but a recessed meter box on your house! Of course, I want a recessed meter box because it's going in the alleyway down the side of the house and it needs to use the least space.

SO, I have to install this myself, and the closest I've ever come to knocking out bricks is with my LEGO kit as a child. :p I have a fair intuition about structures, and suspect that if I simply take a lump hammer and chisel to the outside of my house I should expect nasty things to happen. I obviously need to extract a rectangle of brickwork from the outer wall to sit this meter box in, pushing it in up to the inner wall.

So, my questions are:
1) Is this simple to do??
2) Will I need to worry about supporting the bricks above the box to prevent them from dropping, ie do I need a miniature lintel?
3) Do I need to somehow insert a damp proof membrane to prevent water ingestion into the cavity?
4) Are there any obvious things I need to look out for? Like cavity wall insulation spilling out, or the National Grid telling me I've done an awful job and refusing to install the gas line?

I do home DIY projects all the time, and not to a bad spec' if I say so myself, including dry-lining of my bedrooms, but never anything 'structural' like knocking bricks out of my house.

Any advice most appreciated :)

Thanks, Richard.
 
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because the opening will be only two bricks wide there will be little to worry about regards lintelling. a simple angle steel lintel will suffice.

regarding insulation; we have installed these boxes in walls and they do take up some of the cavity space, so normal thicknesses of insulation cannot be achieved. it's a case of, do what you can with what you've got!

don't worry too much about a cavity tray.

as for removing the bricks; try and take out a piece of brickwork whereby the perp's line up pretty well, as this will make the job a lot simpler. the meter box does have a lip so there will be coverage of the cut edge of bricks.

there are certain parameters laid out by transco regarding location of meter boxes and these details are available when applying for a gas main alteration. transco will not be too fussed about building reg's though, just their reg's.
 

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