Fitting sockets to wooden wall

[Ugh!]

The wall in question is in the kitchen, is of 3/4" thick boards and is the 'under stairs' (in a very old house). The other side of the wall fronts onto the stairway down to the cellar (i.e. no inner skin).
At the moment the sockets are surface mounted but I want to flush mount them.
What would be the most suitable type of pattress box for this situation ?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

How can you flush mount things in a single skin wall that is not thick enough for the boxes?

 

[Ugh!]

Ban,

I suppose the question should have been - is there a safe way of doing this, a box with a completely sealed back. Would a plaster board style box match that description ?
Any other way of doing the job?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Oh, I see - sorry.

Not aware of any such boxes. Plasterboard ones are not sealed, and would not grip a timber wall.

You'd better get busy knocking up some plywood covers for the rears of normal boxes...

 

[Ugh!]

Ban,

I had thought of blanking the holes in the old surface mount boxes and using these ( with long screws ) as rear covers after cutting a suitably sized hole in the wood for the rear connections of the socket plate. However, this would still leave an unprotected surround of the wood wall between the front plate and the rear cover. I would think that this might constitute a fire risk in the (unlikely) event of a 'hot' connection or sparking ??

Whaddayathink ?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

I think that if you think you can't connect the sockets up without a risk of overheating and sparking then you should rethink DIYing...

But seriously - using pattresses like that will be a pain, as the holes for the faceplate screws will need to be so close to the edge of the aperture, and you'll have such a small margin of error between the aperture and the edges of the pattress, and you'll have to wrestle with the things as you fit them as the pattresses will not have their own independent fixing to the wall.

Use normal galvanised boxes - deep ones. Use a jigsaw to accurately cut a hole that's the right size for the box, and screw it through the sides into the wood.

On the rear of the wall, fix something (battens & plywood? velcro-ed "tupperware" boxes?) to stop people poking coathangers and knitting needles into the galvanised boxes, because they will, you know....

Also - I don't know what's on that wall, but if there's a row of wall units, what about a run of dado trunking up against the underside of the cupboards?

 

[Ugh!]

I think that if you think you can't connect the sockets up without a risk of overheating and sparking then you should rethink DIYing...

I did say unlikely - should have put very,very ....

Thanks for your patience on this. Your suggestion to use steel boxes with rear protection sounds sensible.