Re wiring house

monty-doggy

Hello this may sound really stupid, but when a house is rewired, do they strip the plaster to replace the wiring? Meaning every room needs redecorating?
And can they add more plug sockets at the same time?

seven-day-weekend

Yes, they chip away a channel for the wires, although you can have it surface mounted in trunking.

Yes you can have more plugs added.

Davesnave

It is sometimes possible to pull new wires through old sub-plaster trunking to reach switch locations, but often this works better in theory than in practice!

While more plugs can be added to a ring main, there is a limit beyond which a new ring would be preferable.

cynthiacharles

In my house, when I was replacing the socket, the electrician strip the plaster to replace the wiring. Striping the Plaster is the normal Procedure they follow.

princeofpounds

Yes they will normally do something called 'chasing' the walls, which involves cutting a deep groove into the walls.

Personally I think the whole thing is another example of how archaic our building trade is. On old houses of course it's not an issue, but I'm still amazed new housing doesn't have more accessible 'guts'.

jjlandlord

princeofpounds wrote: »

Personally I think the whole thing is another example of how archaic our building trade is. On old houses of course it's not an issue, but I'm still amazed new housing doesn't have more accessible 'guts'.

IMHO, it's really about doing the least amount of work and spending the least amount of money now because no-one cares about the next owner 15-20 years down the line.

moneyistooshorttomention

It would indeed be logical to have "piping" set into walls that wires could just be pulled in and out of as required, but I've yet to come across anywhere with that yet to my knowledge.

I found that, when I had my (recently-bought) house modernised electrically recently that it had the original fusebox, rather than a circuit breaker board:eek: and was told by electricians that there was no question of keeping it, because it just didn't have the capacity to add on the missing electric cooker point in the kitchen or the bit needed for the new shower in the bathroom. Add the fact that I was adding quite a few extra power points into that as well, and I now have a large new circuit breaker board.

jjlandlord

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

It would indeed be logical to have "piping" set into walls that wires could just be pulled in and out of as required, but I've yet to come across anywhere with that yet to my knowledge.

My old-ish house has metal pipes down the walls for all the switches. Indeed it's convenient.

Davesnave

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

It would indeed be logical to have "piping" set into walls that wires could just be pulled in and out of as required, but I've yet to come across anywhere with that yet to my knowledge.

Well, it exists, and most electricians use it, but the diameter is adequate rather than generous. On both plastic and metal versions, used earlier, it only takes a careless blow from a hammer or a kink to make them next to useless for replacement of cables.

princeofpounds

IMHO, it's really about doing the least amount of work and spending the least amount of money now because no-one cares about the next owner 15-20 years down the line.

Yeah probably a big factor.

Well, it exists, and most electricians use it, but the diameter is adequate rather than generous. On both plastic and metal versions, used earlier, it only takes a careless blow from a hammer or a kink to make them next to useless for replacement of cables

Interesting to know... I sank my own piping into the floor to carry a sky cable, and it was surprising how wide it had to be to allow the cable to bend around the corner where it needed to come up to the wall socket.

G_M

My (1850) property was probobly wired in the 1950s.

When I had it rewired there was very little chasing and very little damage.

In nearly all cases the sparkie tied the new wire to the end of the old, then pulled it through.

The only areas where he needed to cut into the plaster was where I wanted new wall lights installed.

When shopping around and getting quotes for the work, ask what the sparkie intends to do. I suspect pulling through may even be cheaper than having to chase out the plaster.......