Fuse box for house is in the garage.

mikey_bach

Looking to buy a bungalow hiuse fine but we noticed the fuse box for the bungalow is in the garage and a wire goes across to the bungalow.  The garage is detached from the bungalow with a possible asbestos roof.   Have put an offer in and going to have a survey  Anyone seen similar before.  We will get the seller to test for asbestos if the survey picks it up and adjust the offer.   

user1977

Are you sure it's "the fuse box for the bungalow" rather than a fuse box for the garage? Don't think it necessarily matters.

ProDave

There is a whole estate of them here in the north of Scotland. Is that where you are looking.

Nothing intrinsically wrong other than when something trips you have to go out to the garage to investigate.  Keep a head torch handy for those dark winter nights.  and don't fill your garage with so much "stuff" that you can't get to the fuse box.

Not so bad if there is a pedestrian door to the garage under the covered walkway, but one I found the only way in to the garage was through the up and over door, with a broken counterweight so it was really hard to open.

mikey_bach

Its for the house said cooker on a fuse.  If the garage roof is asbestos its shelf life is 50 years could leak then onto the fuse box

user1977

mikey_bach said:

Its for the house said cooker on a fuse.  If the garage roof is asbestos its shelf life is 50 years could leak then onto the fuse box

The house roof could leak too! You'd be fixing a leaky roof anyway, surely?

newsgroupmonkey_

mikey_bach said:

Looking to buy a bungalow hiuse fine but we noticed the fuse box for the bungalow is in the garage and a wire goes across to the bungalow.  The garage is detached from the bungalow with a possible asbestos roof.   Have put an offer in and going to have a survey  Anyone seen similar before.  We will get the seller to test for asbestos if the survey picks it up and adjust the offer.   

I lived in a Bungalow, built in the 70s. The fusebox was in the garage also.
Never an issue.

tooldle

I live in a bungalow. Our consumer unit is……………. Yep, in the garage. Never had an issue.

lincroft1710

It is very easy to tell if a garage has a corrugated asbestos cement roof. If your surveyor doesn't recognise it, sack them!. No need to ask the seller "to test for asbestos" There will be hundreds of thousands of similar garages throughout the UK and the roofs can last more than 50 years.

Section62

mikey_bach said:

Looking to buy a bungalow hiuse fine but we noticed the fuse box for the bungalow is in the garage and a wire goes across to the bungalow.

Just one wire?

mikey_bach said:

Its for the house said cooker on a fuse.

Not entirely unknown for an ex-house fuseboard/consumer unit to be re-used in a shed or garage, and not necessarily by someone taking care to remove old labels.  I'd not assume this is the house fuses/CU based only on what is written on it.  You'd also expect several wires from the fuses/CU going into the house, not just one.

mikey_bach said:

If the garage roof is asbestos its shelf life is 50 years could leak then onto the fuse box

Asbestos cement (if that is what it is) can last a lot longer than 50 years without leaking.  If the sheets aren't damaged and the bolts were correctly fitted with seals then it won't necessarily be a problem.

tooldle

We also had an asbestos garage roof. It was the sheet type, so not so easy to identify. We had it tested, (can’t remember how much but not expensive). Luckily our roof had partly collapsed so the eventual removal was considered to be ‘outdoors’ making it far cheaper than an indoor removal.

Bigphil1474

Asbestos cement panel roofs are fine if in good condition, and as tooldle says, pretty cheap to dispose if not (compared to asbestos inside the house). It's not even worth paying to have it tested - if it's more than 25 years old or so, assume it does contain asbestos and work on that basis.

You could get the consumer unit moved inside the house, but presumably it's in the garage cos that's where the leccy meter and main wire into the property is located? Much more complicated to get the meter moved. You could put a box round the consumer unit if you are worried about leaks.