House electrics

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

Is it normal for just about every socket in a house to be daisy chained from spur to spur and all the sockets to a single point on the RCD? It's a Victorian terrace so the wiring is old as the live is red, neutral black and earth is bare twisted pair, live and neutral look to be 6mm2 cores at a glance but haven't measured with a vernier to confirm.

I've no knowledge of domestic circuits or how they should be set up and about out of cash to get someone out, but I want to inspect what I can to see what's safe and what's not before we move everything in. If plaster has to start coming off again...

The house was rented by the previous owners and the tenants lived there seemingly trouble free, but it all smells a bit fishy to me.

winston1 · 26 Jul 2017

Sounds like a radial. No such thing as "normal", radials or rings can be used. Doubt if it is 6mm cable and doubt if it goes straight into an RCD. No fuses or MCBs?

Turnsnip said:
I've no knowledge of domestic circuits or how they should be set up and about out of cash to get someone out

You will have to find the cash I'm afraid.

JohnW2 · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
Is it normal for just about every socket in a house to be daisy chained from spur to spur and all the sockets to a single point on the RCD?

It sounds as if you are describing a radial circuit. Provided the size of the cable is appropriate, it is a perfectly acceptable design and, indeed, many people think it preferable to the 'ring' circuit which has been widely used since WW2.

Kind Regards, John

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

It's a big old cable. I (edit: I thought) it's a ring, I haven't tested it with my multimeter yet. I originally thought it was two circuits but I found a wire leading upstairs around where I thought the midway point would be on the downstairs circuit. None of the sockets are fused but additional lights and extractors etc that have been added at some point are fused, so I guess these are spurred off the main. I've already ripped out a few fused Spurs as they had sockets in the cabinet next to the sink which I thought was outrageous, and I'd never have used it anyway.

Yes the MCB sorry.

I'd have thought the kitchen would have its own circuit, the downstairs on a separate circuit and the upstairs on another circuit. I now think all the sockets are on one, all the lights on another and a third circuit just for the electric oven connection.

Daft and possibly dangerous?

And that sinplynjust isn't going to happen, I can't spend what I don't have. Shame I didn't discover this earlier when I could have.

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

And just to add is assumed it was a ring circuit due to the new position of the new mcb when it was installed and position of new sockets in the wall next to it would have made perfect sense for a ring circuit.

JohnW2 · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
It's a big old cable. I (edit: I thought) it's a ring, I haven't tested it with my multimeter yet.

If it has only one connection to an MCB, it cannot be a ring - it must be a radial.

What is the rating of the MCB?

Turnsnip said:
I'd have thought the kitchen would have its own circuit, the downstairs on a separate circuit and the upstairs on another circuit. I now think all the sockets are on one, all the lights on another and a third circuit just for the electric oven connection. Daft and possibly dangerous?

Not what we would usually do today, but once common and not 'dangerous, per se. If everything has been done properly, the MCB would trip if you attempted to substantially overload the one sockets circuit with too many/too large loads.

Kind Regards, John

JohnW2 · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
And just to add is assumed it was a ring circuit due to the new position of the new mcb when it was installed and position of new sockets in the wall next to it would have made perfect sense for a ring circuit.

Just to be clear, am I correctly understanding you to be saying that there is just one MCB (with one cable connected to it) for the one sockets circuit?

Kind Regards, John

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

JohnW2 said:
Just to be clear, am I correctly understanding you to be saying that there is just one MCB (with one cable connected to it) for the one sockets circuit?

Kind Regards, John

Big consumer unit, mcb/rcd whatever it is (I did say I know little about domestic electrics

). All the sockets on one switch.

I've just gone to grab my multimeter, calliper and metal/voltage detector thingy but got dragged into work. I'll set to this evening and map all the wiring, size, resistance etc and report back.

May have posted this thread somewhat prematurely out of anger, but it seems an awful lot to me to be on one circuit when you factor in washing machines, dishwashers, tumble dryers, hair dryers etc...

JohnW2 · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
Big consumer unit, mcb/rcd whatever it is (I did say I know little about domestic electrics ). All the sockets on one switch.

I think we may have misunderstood you, then. If it's just one circuit, then "all on one switch" is what you'd have - whether it is a radial or ring circuit. I/we thought you meant that there was only one cable connected to the MCB. The only difference between a simple radial circuit and a ring is that that the last of the 'daisy-chained' sockets has a cable going back to the MCB in the CU - so both ends of the 'daisy chain' are connected to the MCB.

Turnsnip said:
May have posted this thread somewhat prematurely out of anger, but it seems an awful lot to me to be on one circuit when you factor in washing machines, dishwashers, tumble dryers, hair dryers etc...

Indeed, although you would obviously not usually/often have all those things running at the same time. As I said, if it's been designed properly there is no actual 'danger', since if one tried to use too many things at once, the MCB would trip before the cable got hot enough to do any harm ... so, a potential 'inconvenience', rather than a danger.

Kind Regards, John

winston1 · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
I've already ripped out a few fused Spurs as they had sockets in the cabinet next to the sink which I thought was outrageous, and I'd never have used it anyway.

Not outrageous at all. Could be useful for a sink disposal unit/macerator, or perhaps an adjacent dish washer.

EFLImpudence · 26 Jul 2017

No offence Turnsnip and you do admit you have no knowledge, so it would be better if you acquired some knowledge before doing anything.

At the moment you have no idea how/what to inspect and tell what is safe/unsafe so it is pointless you looking.

ban-all-sheds · 26 Jul 2017

Turnsnip said:
And that sinplynjust isn't going to happen, I can't spend what I don't have.

What would you do if your car failed its MOT because of something dangerous (i.e. not for a broken number plate light, for instance) and you couldn't afford a repair. Would you carry on using it?

What if you had a dodgy gas appliance putting CO into the house, and couldn't afford to replace it? Would you carry on using it?

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

EFLImpudence said:
No offence Turnsnip and you do admit you have no knowledge, so it would be better if you acquired some knowledge before doing anything.

At the moment you have no idea how/what to inspect and tell what is safe/unsafe so it is pointless you looking.

I'm not a complete electrical idiot. I'm a fully trained sound engineer/studio tech and my training involved all sorts from making cables, finding and getting rid of/protecting against faults in equipment such as ground loops, emi, rfi etc. fairly complex stuff, all of which has come into use since finishing, and plenty of experience setting up low voltage circuits for machinery and equipment but nothing to do with mains electricity and I've never touched it before either. All new to me but I'm sure I can pick it up simply enough. I'm not going to go installing RCD's and rewiring the house but I feel I have the competence to find out what's going on and what needs keeping an eye on before I can get a pro in to sort out once I know what I'm looking for.

If there is anything wrong with it of course. Never having lived in an old house I'd assumed all house circuits were ring and up/down/kitchen would have its own, now I know that not to be the case. When I first found the wire going up I just got ****ed off seeing a situation where I couldn't have the telly on upstairs if the tumble dryer and washer were on in the kitchen, and posted this thread.

EFLImpudence · 26 Jul 2017

Q.E.D.

Turnsnip said:
I've no knowledge of domestic circuits or how they should be set up

The house was rented by the previous owners and the tenants lived there seemingly trouble free, but it all smells a bit fishy to me.

Turnsnip · 26 Jul 2017

ban-all-sheds said:
What would you do if your car failed its MOT because of something dangerous (i.e. not for a broken number plate light, for instance) and you couldn't afford a repair. Would you carry on using it?

What if you had a dodgy gas appliance putting CO into the house, and couldn't afford to replace it? Would you carry on using it?

If my car failed it's mot I would fix it. If it was something I couldn't do I would get a mate to do it. I don't know any electricians to ask.

Gas appliance would obviously have to go off until I could afford to get it sorted. This is a bit different, the electrics obviously work ok, everything is earthed, I was just worried about potentially overloading the circuit. And I'm not planning on doing any work with the electrics either, I was concerned about figuring out what's safe to use. Right now I don't have the cash to bring someone round to check it all over.

From the replies and the research I've done since it would have been unnecessary anyway. This radial circuit type at first thought just didn't seem safe or proper, turns out it is. And that is essentially the question I asked.

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House electrics

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