Electrical socket replacement

[John]

We have a 13A double switched socket in a tiled location. I don't know how old it is but it's an old-fashioned type with four fixing screws, two at the top and two at the bottom, as opposed to the modern ones of one at each side. The socket was physically damaged when something hit it recently so needs to be replaced. Is there any sort of adapter plate or something that will get us round the problem of the fixing screws without having to replace the backbox as well, or do I have to gingerly extracate the backbox from said tiles?

TIA

[Phil L]

I doubt you're going to find a socket face with 4 screw holes. Why not just get a surface socket and backbox and affix it over the hole, providing the existing cables have enough slack of course

[John]

Good idea Phil, may just do that if nothing better comes my way. Thanks.

[NT]

Another perhaps is to epoxy pieces of hardwood in each side of the backbox and screw thin coarse thread scrwes into it. Generous pilot hole essential on such small pieces.

NT

[Invisible Man]

Had 2 of these in a room I recently did from top to bottom. Probably date back to the 1960s. I just mangled the back boxes so they would come out and put new ones in. However I wasn't dealing with tiles. If you contemplate replacement make sure the new backbox will fit in the space between and behind the tiles or you are wasting your time.

[ARWadsworth]

Have you actually looked behind the broken socket yet?

Quite often these old back boxes had 6 mounting holes (4 where you can now see the exiting mounting screws) and two others that match the holes on a modern socket.

Cheers

Adam

[John]

Ah, now that sounds like a plan. Thanks. :-)

[John]

No, not looked yet Adam but if it has, that'll be brilliant. Cheers.

[ARWadsworth]

You often have to remove the 4 lugs that are been used at the moment to get a modern sock to fit.

Adam

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "John" saying something like:

You might be lucky and find the backbox has the end lugs anyway. Some of the four-hole ones were actually six-hole.

[NT]

acutally mite make more sense to use epoxy to make up the bulk, using some sort of form to hold it as it sets. The challenge is to get sufficient strength.

NT

[Owain]

Would it be possible to drill corresponding mounting holes in a new socket?

Or buy a 'new' old one on fleabay?

Owain

[Pete Verdon]

If I were doing that I'd mix in lots of microfibres to make a stiff enough paste that it didn't slump. I've used this to fill holes and cutouts in both horizontal and vertical surface. Support is needed under the horizontal ones, but the paste stands up on its own to fill holes in vertical panels.

Pete

[js.b1]

Post a picture, it may be possible to fold in the old box and fit a new standard box. Depends on how the cables are arranged, what condition they are in, whether the old tiles are cement or PVA bonded and so on.

Good restoration project :-)