Hi everyone
as you may know, me and my dad are rewiring my house and we have just had the consumer unit changed to a brand spanking new General Electric one (Are they any good? It was either a choice of that or Square D or something). Thanks to everyone for help with that. Seeing as there were no seals it allowed me to save a few quid by not having the spark out - as the council is assessing my work.
I have a few questions regarding the routing of cables through the joists/underneath the floor boards.
1. I am aware that I have to drill holes through joists so the edge of the hole is 50mm below the top of the joist but are there any regs as to how close I can or cannot drill through with respect to walls. For example you can only run the cable a maximum of 450mm from a wall?
2. I don't want to have to rip up my floorboards as they take ages to take up, the prat that put them down before used a combination of no more nails and nails with funny heads and they are complete pain to pull up so I was wondering how frequently I need to clip the cable? Are there any regs with regard to this. When I looked at the original installation the original sparkie had laid the cable along the top of the ceiling (parallel to the joist) and clipped once every 8 ft or so. Would this be acceptable and within regs or should I just bite the bullet and cut my floorboards anyway?
3. really a bit of a follow on from 1. Can the cable just go anywhere across the floor or is it constrained to a set distance from walls?
The reasons for me asking questions 1 and 3 are that my local sparkie who I suspect is a cowboy said it would cost me £200 just parts for a new Consumer Unit and that a full rewire would be 5k (for a 2 bed terrace) as he could not go more than 18inches away from a wall? After his first statement I thought he was pulling a fast one so I thought best to get some impartial advice.
Thanks again
Lorraine.
as you may know, me and my dad are rewiring my house and we have just had the consumer unit changed to a brand spanking new General Electric one (Are they any good? It was either a choice of that or Square D or something). Thanks to everyone for help with that. Seeing as there were no seals it allowed me to save a few quid by not having the spark out - as the council is assessing my work.
I have a few questions regarding the routing of cables through the joists/underneath the floor boards.
1. I am aware that I have to drill holes through joists so the edge of the hole is 50mm below the top of the joist but are there any regs as to how close I can or cannot drill through with respect to walls. For example you can only run the cable a maximum of 450mm from a wall?
2. I don't want to have to rip up my floorboards as they take ages to take up, the prat that put them down before used a combination of no more nails and nails with funny heads and they are complete pain to pull up so I was wondering how frequently I need to clip the cable? Are there any regs with regard to this. When I looked at the original installation the original sparkie had laid the cable along the top of the ceiling (parallel to the joist) and clipped once every 8 ft or so. Would this be acceptable and within regs or should I just bite the bullet and cut my floorboards anyway?
3. really a bit of a follow on from 1. Can the cable just go anywhere across the floor or is it constrained to a set distance from walls?
The reasons for me asking questions 1 and 3 are that my local sparkie who I suspect is a cowboy said it would cost me £200 just parts for a new Consumer Unit and that a full rewire would be 5k (for a 2 bed terrace) as he could not go more than 18inches away from a wall? After his first statement I thought he was pulling a fast one so I thought best to get some impartial advice.
Thanks again
Lorraine.