Socket Ring rearrangement.

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Currently in the process of trying to get my head round how best to wire up my house and could do with a little advice.

Due to the house having been extended then extended some more and finally extended again the electrics are a bit of a mess!

Old Ringmain arrangement was.

1- Upstairs Ring with spurs feeding down to the sum total of 2 sockets in the lounge and dining room. Plus the current kitchen extension was cut into the ring to feed the kitchen too(gas oven and hob so not massive load just sockets). And also Central heating!
2- Old kitchen
3- other extension

Ultimately this is what i'm thinking.

1 - Just upstairs ring
2 - Old kitchen becomes utility room but ring also feeds lounge and office therefore becoming downstairs ring main
3- Other extension gets the usual openplan treatment to become kitchen/dining room.
4- Current kitchen becomes gym and gets its own Ring.

Firstly ignoring the fact I haven't actually done any form of calculation regarding loads on circuits yet, gut feeling wise can anyone see a problem with my plan?

My inexperienced gut is telling me there is a possible problem with the 2nd circuit being Utility and rest of the original downstairs. We are likely to only have a Combined washer dryer and Freezer and fridge in there so not huge amounts of white goods but combine that with the typical stuff you have plugged in downstairs would that be a bit much?
 
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It could work, there are a number of things to look at when selecting ring final or radial supplies to sockets.
1) The loop impedance, this controls the ability for the supply MCB to trip with a short circuit, and also the volt drop, so in essence the shorter the wires the better.
2) Impact if it trips, specially with RCD protection if it trips you don't want lights to also go out, and if it will not reset, emergency cables up/down stairs is clearly something to be avoided.
3) Likelihood of over load. If the ring final supply's oven, tumble drier, washing machine, immersion heater and hob then there is a good chance it could exceed 32 amp, so you would look at what could be removed, that would likely be the immersion heater we would normally have a dedicated circuit for that.

So if we look at a standard house you have four options when installing two rings.
1) Split up/down
2) Split side/side
3) Split front back
4) Split kitchen rest of house
There will be more, but those are the basic options, with a small 2 up 2 down it will hardly matter, but with a large house, options 2 or 3 will reduce loop impedance but if the lights are split up/down unless you use RCBO's then the RCD could be supplying both lights and sockets in the same room, so if some thing goes wrong and you trip the RCD you will also be plunged into darkness.

This whole process is a risk assessment, and the designer has to weigh up the chances of over loads, and danger including how he can run cables, the 1/3 rule for drilling beams may mean either option 2 or 3 will use far less cable than other because of where you can run the cable, wiring is not just thrown in, there needs to be some design involved.

When a new consumer unit was fitted to this house with RCD protection it was realised lights split up/down and sockets split front back, so needed at least 4 RCD's so only way really was RCBO's for every circuit.

But you will need to sign paperwork saying you have designed, installed and tested and you must do exactly that, and only the person doing it can decide what is required, are the stairs lit from outside if not will it need emergency lighting? All we can do is point out some of the easy mistakes that can be made.
 
Sponsored Links
It could work, there are a number of things to look at when selecting ring final or radial supplies to sockets.
1) The loop impedance, this controls the ability for the supply MCB to trip with a short circuit, and also the volt drop, so in essence the shorter the wires the better.
2) Impact if it trips, specially with RCD protection if it trips you don't want lights to also go out, and if it will not reset, emergency cables up/down stairs is clearly something to be avoided.
3) Likelihood of over load. If the ring final supply's oven, tumble drier, washing machine, immersion heater and hob then there is a good chance it could exceed 32 amp, so you would look at what could be removed, that would likely be the immersion heater we would normally have a dedicated circuit for that.

So if we look at a standard house you have four options when installing two rings.
1) Split up/down
2) Split side/side
3) Split front back
4) Split kitchen rest of house
There will be more, but those are the basic options, with a small 2 up 2 down it will hardly matter, but with a large house, options 2 or 3 will reduce loop impedance but if the lights are split up/down unless you use RCBO's then the RCD could be supplying both lights and sockets in the same room, so if some thing goes wrong and you trip the RCD you will also be plunged into darkness.

This whole process is a risk assessment, and the designer has to weigh up the chances of over loads, and danger including how he can run cables, the 1/3 rule for drilling beams may mean either option 2 or 3 will use far less cable than other because of where you can run the cable, wiring is not just thrown in, there needs to be some design involved.

When a new consumer unit was fitted to this house with RCD protection it was realised lights split up/down and sockets split front back, so needed at least 4 RCD's so only way really was RCBO's for every circuit.

But you will need to sign paperwork saying you have designed, installed and tested and you must do exactly that, and only the person doing it can decide what is required, are the stairs lit from outside if not will it need emergency lighting? All we can do is point out some of the easy mistakes that can be made.



Thank you for taking the time to make such a detailed response.

Ive now got more direction with the planning.

My trouble is it isn't really possible to plan the house from scratch and rip out and start again as the house is a work in progress and we just don't have the budget to do everything in one go so it'll have to be changed bit by bit. Not ideal I know but it is what it is

One thing that I can say is though that all the work will be done properly.
 

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