Advice needed - installing electric outside?

maninthestreet

It's not clear exactly what work the OP has carried out, but there is a reference to a 'new power socket' - surely this work will need to signed-off by an electrician qualified to Part P?
The fact that the OP struggled for a hour just to get the cable through the outside wall suggests they are inexperienced in such work - even I know that you can do this quite easily and quickly if a wire coat hanger is used.....

ally18

Thankyou for your comments since my update but to advise further.

1. The lighting circuit was NOT used as per my comments.

2. Both qualified electricians quoted stating 1.5mm steel armoured cable would be used. As they are qualified electricians they should be quoting the correct materials I believe.

3. I did struggle with the getting the cable through the wall because I didn't have a wire coat hanger to hand however I eventually used something else which did the job ok.

4. The external plug socket is an outdoor, weatherproof socket as required. The internal plug is an RCD plug which just plugs straight into the wall socket.

5. The whole outdoor socket, cable, RCD plug etc came as a complete pack for DIY use. Everything is connected together already and all I had to do was lay the armoured cable and connect the internal cable to the RCD which is exactly the same as refitting a plug.

I thought the whole point of this forum was money saving in the best way possible, providing it is safe and legal to do so.

My thanks to those who gave me the constructive advice.

maninthestreet

OP - do you have a link you can post for thsi kit? - I might be interested in it myself....

dil1976

It must be a really good piece of kit, seeing as a DIY store sells it.

ally18

To maninthestreet,

I don't have a link to post but you can find the packs in the well known DIY store with two letters in their title. Only the bigger main stores though.

The packs come in 3 cable lengths, 5m, 10m and 25m and the costs for the 10m was, I think, £69 and the 25m £92. The only thing extra you will have to buy is more cable clips as the pack doesn't come with a lot, I only had 6 but if you intend to bury the cable then you don't need that many.

It was the perfect solution for me.

Jaynne

Given that you have an RCD and armoured cable I'm not sure what else you would need. Just be sure to always use the RCD otherwise you could get a bit of a shock getting into the tub. Good job on the money saving.

A lot of electricians seem to like to present all electrical work as some kind of voodoo but it's not. I'm sure they must see a lot of horendous bodges but they're just that bodges. Its perfectly possible to do a lot of it yourself if you read up on what you have to do and frankly the rules and regs on electrical works are ever evolving, what was "safe" 20 years ago may not be regarded as such today.

System

i thought you could change like for like but anything else had to be done by an electrician

dil1976

Competent is the key word for electrical work, prove that and you are fine.

But remember should anything go wrong with what you have installed and you don't have the relevant qualifications be prepared for the worse.

By the sounds of what the OP has done, needs Part P notifying to LABC.

Jaynne

CHRISSYG wrote: »

i thought you could change like for like but anything else had to be done by an electrician

Definitely not true. You can do an awful lot without notification. As soon as you get in a kitchen or bathroom though that's not the case you can also read up on the other exceptions.

mostly_harmless

dil1976 wrote: »

By the sounds of what the OP has done, needs Part P notifying to LABC.

I think the key dodge here is the fact that it plugs in and is therefore not fixed. It is, in effect, an extension lead and not fixed wiring which would be notifiable as per part P. And as it's uses an RCD there is a limit to the number of things that can go wrong.

Only thing I'd caution would be to make sure it disappears when it comes to house selling time.