Electric main cable to the house

[david.cawkwell]

Hi Group

Strange one this.

I live in a group of houses and the electric meters are all in a brick shed on one of the gardens of the houses.

The owner of the house has now decided that he wants to knock the shed down and move his meter to the house. Fine. So he's told them to move the meters. Didn't know he could actually get away with this. There is also a transformer on his garden but that is staying.

So this morning I find two guys from an electricity subcontractors on my doorstep wanting to talk about moving the meters.

Fine I say just move the meters to a meter box on my property which seems to most sensible idea. "No were not happy about using your cable and they want to dig up all the cable right to the houses" . I know for a fact that the cable to my house was only laid abouted 10-15 years ago so this seems madness.

As far as I can see they only need to put a meter box at the edge of my property and connect my existing cable to the new location of the meter. The new location of the meter will be right over where the existing cable goes.

I don't think they have a right to start replacing my cable on my property for what I can see as no good reason.

They also seem to be under the impression that I'm going to need to get an electrician in to connect it up. What? Did I ask for any of this?

Sounds to me like a subcontractor trying to get more money from the local electricity company for what is a smallish job.

[Colin Wilson]

They can't use your private cable from the existing point of supply to where you want it - standard practice - and on top of that, there are a couple of safety implications:

a) they don't know the condition of the cable b) they won't be authorised to work on that cable as it isn't one used by the REC

You might not have asked for it, but if the existing point of supply is removed, how else would you like to get your electricity - telepathy doesn't work very well for it... they're not allowed to connect up your installation, which is why you need your own electrician. Ideally, they'll terminate the REC supply in a double pole isolator, and your electrician will connect the tails from the consumer unit into that.

How old are the houses - you (should) find that there is an easement in the deeds for your house (and his) meaning he shouldn't be able to knock down the shed. Just because he wants his cable moving doesn't mean he has rights to remove everyone elses' supply while he's at it.

Try having a word with whichever REC it is looking to do the work, and who'd footing the bill. At present, my understanding is that your point of supply is in the shed, and regulatory rules state that you can't be left off supply due to the termination of wayleaves by a third party - so for a badly formed set of deeds, they may have no choice other than to supply your property by an alterate route.

The main issue I see though is that your point of supply is in the shed, and you should have rights to keep it there in your deeds.

Any cable beyond that point of supply is part of your installation (which is another reason why they can't re-use your cable).

You *must* have some sort of easement to get the cable from the point of supply to your premises.

[me]

"Colin Wilson" wrote in message news: [e-mail]...

Surely they will take the supply into the house and connect to the first rather large fuse/connection block. The other side of which is already connected to the electricity meter and then the consumer unit. We had our gas main replaced recntly and they connect it to the gas meter - we did not need a plumber to do any work on our side of the meter.

[david.cawkwell]

Thanks for the reply. I don't think they would be using my cable for the supply. They would just need to move the point of supply to my land. This would then be the edge of my property. In effect my cable is then shortened and connected to the new point of supply rather than running all the way to the old supply point.

Its just taking the whole cable up from the current supply point to my house seems madness it must be 40 or 50 yards and would cause a lot of disruption.

I've had a reply from uk.legal and they said

"I suggest you do not negotiate with any sub-contractor but protest directly to your supplier. My starting position would be that I had a supply agreement with them and required them to continue to supply under that agreement. I would suggest that they were free to make whatever changes they needed to make or chose to make in the in routing of their cables and the siting of their meter but at their expense. "

This seems reasonable so I'll follow that. If it gets messy I'll have to check with my solicator about the deeds and things. Yuk.

[Dorothy Bradbury]

So you want... o REC to lay *their* cable to the edge of your land o REC to fit a "meter cupboard" at the edge of your land o REC to fit their Service-Cut-Out Fuse & Meter inside

You would then... o Supply a 100A Switchfuse (DP Isolator & HBC fuse) o Use your *existing* cable to bring power into the house

Basically "adopting" your cable may not be possible. o Potentially - it might have branches re unmetered supply o Potentially - it might not be laid correctly o Potentially - it might not be of sufficient size (35mm CSA?)

If you did go this route, realise there are some costs. o 100A Switchfuse is £80-100

---- High Breaking Capacity fuse protects *your* cable o Your cable still needs to be 25mm CSA

---- may aready be, but meter voltage drop is limited to 4%

You need to check deeds re Easement etc.

They can make rather interesting reading. We have one to put a CU on the REC meter wooden board. Reason is Merseypower put the supply in the wrong place as they lost revised architects paperwork. BCO would not let the Builder put the CU under the hot/cold water tanks (in the room above). Explains our simply huge meter board and a right pain it is because it prevents real heating in that room.

[Colin Wilson]

That's not a company i've heard of ?!?

[Colin Wilson]

If you re-read the original post, his point of supply is in a remote shed, not in his house as-is. The "rather large fuse/connection block" is known as a cut-out or cable-head, and is typically the suppliers' equipment - but this will also be at the remote end in the "shed".

[Dorothy Bradbury]

The nickname for Manweb :-)

Q - How do REC move loop-in + Peak/E7 timed contactor outside?

Single phase, PILC, CU would then be >3m so Switchfuse etc.

1. Loop-in can be retained via cutout in the outside meter box.

1. Peak/E7 timed contactor is more difficult because a) it is a big Siemens/Sangamo 80A cube and b) it creates two more tails. E7 load is 16A only as backup about 4-20x a year so rarely used.

So does that require twin 100A Switchfuse or is 4-pole (3P+N) permitted because it is at least all on the same phase albeit timed?

Manweb do not get paid enough: whilst a plumber removed the main equipotential bonding, Manweb fitted earth clamps to the

*PILC sheath* whilst replacing service cutout. Danger money.

[Colin Wilson]

Considering I work for them... (no, really - since 1985)

If Dataserve can't get their equipment in a standard meter cupboard... :-p

A slight twist on this is that Dataserve don't normally provide load switching, but did do at one point "for a fee". AFAIK the closest they tend to come nowadays is to fit a radio-telemeter to switch between the two tariffs (peak/off-peak) - how the consumer handles their load is their own problem to sort out.

Not sure - is there one fitted at the moment ? - is the contactor "yours" or Manwebs' equipment ? - it'd be interesting to call whoever your supplier is to ask them to fit an isolator for you...

Was it a clamp or a sweated earth ? - afaik, although we're moving to using a mechanical clamp, they haven't fully come into use yet - so any earth to a PILC cable should be soldered atm I believe unless the lads have been on the training...

[Dorothy Bradbury]

1997 the old contactor/timer seized "on". Manweb replaced with a "radio-telemeter", 80A Siemens/Sangamo contactor/timer by the meter (both big cubes vs modern micro).

Contactor is Manwebs. Main CU has a separate & internal 100A isolator for confusion :-) E7 Mini-CU has integral 100A isolator only fed by radio-telemeter.

If cutout/meter/telemeter were moved outside, we would need SWA for CU + SWA from radio-telemeter + 2x 100A switchfuses. Not sure if cutout/meter/telemeter/2-switchfuses fit in a meterbox.

If not we can dump the telemeter, use 1 switch-fuse and the main CU operates the backup 2.5kW storage heater via 1-way timer. Meterbox need only hold cutout/meter/1-switchfuse & 1x SWA, and that could be one of those "micro-meter/isolator combos".

EC14-style earth clamps onto PILC sheath, which lead up to an earth bar at the RHS of the black plastic service cutout. It was done to boost the earth whilst plumbers fought over re-routing.

The loop-in supply cables are 2" below the paved surface, I think because there is a 24" railway drain 60cm below that. No-one has found the water main despite several cat-n-jenny surveys & holes. Neighbour found supply cables via spade :-)