Complete Re-wire. Has this been done correctly? Has Sparky taken shortcuts?

Frank_Sebem

Hi all

I have posted in this forum before and I enjoy reading the no nonsens
e answers and then following up these answers by researching people's advice.

So, this thread relates to a run down terraced House I have just bought in order to renovate. Now, the wife & I did exactly this last year and enjoyed it so much that we want to do it again. So, without further ado here's the facts. The previous house was completely gutted and required amongst other things a re-wire. We searched for a Sparky who had the proper qualifications etc and checked his credentials before he started the rewire. The House was a complete shell. Even the ceilings were down & the plaster removed from every wall. So, the Sparky rewired the House over the course of 2 weeks on & off, coming & going. I paid him £2000 and received all the Paperwork & certificates etc and all was fine until I was watching one of those renovation programmes on TV. On the program the House was being rewired too. However, it was done different to the rewire we had done in that when the new wires were pinned to the wall in the house, the sparky on TV then fixed a protective metal conduit over the wires coming from the ceiling to the light switches. Now I know that our Sparky DID NOT fit this conduit last year. After he had completely rewired (1st fix) we then got the whole House Dot & dabbed & replastered. Then the sparky did the 2nd fix. At the time I wasn't aware of the metal conduit, but I am now sat here a little worried that if somebody was to knock a nail in the wall through the new plaster it could hit a wire that is not protected by Metal conduit. Therefore my question is:

Considering that this re-wire was only 12 months ago should the Sparky of protected the wires with Metal conduit? What do the regulations say? Is this a requirement/necessity etc or is the re-wire OK?

Thanks all

Ectophile

There's no requirement for metal conduit if the circuit is protected by an RCD. Almost all new consumer units these days have RCDs on all circuits. If that's the case, then there's no problem.

MX5huggy

I am not a sparky but.

The metal is not required it is fairly thin anyway a nail would pass trough it fairly unnoticed.

What is required is to protect the wires from plasters trowels which are very sharp and can nick the cables. But you had dot a dab so maybe don't need this protection.

Additionally you can use plastic conduit instead of the metal for this.

waynehayes

Your mistaking metal conduit for metal capping. This capping offers very minimal protection to cables and there is no requirement in the 'regs' to use it. It certainly wouldn't stop a nail or screw.

keystone

I too suspect the OP may mean capping rather than conduit.



In reality what thats for is to protect the cable from the clumsy spread nicking it with his trowel.

Oh - MX5huggy got there first.

Cheers

tlh858

There are several ways of fixing cables to walls. Plastic or steel capping is one of them. Oval conduit and clipping the cable to the surface are two other methods.

None of this makes any difference to the level of protection - nails and screws will easily pass through both steel and plastic capping.

Frank_Sebem

Thanks all for your input. BTW I did mean capping.