Spur + spur from ring?

[T i m]

Hi all,

I was just round some friends who are quickly 'doing up' an older place to house some friends of theirs.

While I was being shown round she asked me if it would be (technically) [1] possible to put a socket on the wall on a landing, being fed from the back of the socket the other side of the wall in a bedroom (her electrician is on hols for two weeks and she wanted to know if to decorate that area or not).

I poped the top off the existing (double) socket and noted there were

3 sets of wires, potentially ring in / out and 'another'. On the other side of the room was a single socket and 'probably' the other end of this spur.

My (general) question is what are the rules re taking another spur off this ring point (assuming you can get 4 x 2.5mm in the connectors etc), especially as this and the existing are only single sockets (I'm thinking this spur *could* have fed a double?).

In practice the existing socket will probably only be feeding a table lamp and the new one on the landing would be for a suction cleaner (not that makes any difference to the regs etc) ;-)

All the best ..

T i m

[1] The lady reminded me that I ran / wired some SWA to a waterproof socket in the garden for her when I was 17 .. 32 years ago ... and it's still working!

[Owain]

Well ... technically it could give rise to a high point load but I AFAICR there's nothing against it in the Regs.

The space in the terminals and the back box for the wires is going to be the killer - bear in mind the requirement for "good workmanship".

T' simplest way would probably be to spur off the double socket to an adjacent FCU, then run both single sockets downstream of the FCU.

Be about time for its periodic inspection and insulation test then.

Owain

[Andrew Gabriel]

Different makes vary. Be prepared to go out and buy a good replacement socket with plenty of terminal capacity. The other issue will be is there enough space in the back box for another cable? Generally, you need a deeper box when you have so many cables entering the box.

[T i m]

Ok thanks, I'll pass that on ..

Oh indeed. Whenever I have done this in the past I try to ensure the cables enter the back of the box in the right order so they lay in parallel inside the box etc (not twisting all over each other) and with enough of the sheath stripped back to give flexibility whilst keeping the sheath within the box etc. One thing I had then and am still hanging onto now is pride in what I do. It's a rare day when I look at other folks work (these days) and think 'that's neat' .. ;-(

Probably. But I can't touch any of it now days can I ..?

All the best ..

T i m

[T i m]

Understood. I think the existing *may* cope (I didn't want to pull it about too much) but the owner wouldn't be against a new double socket if needed.

The

The existing double is on the (large) skirting on a deep surface plastic box. I think they would be able to get another T&E in there but might have to open up the hole in the box / skirting first.

As the 'new' socket is only going to be on the other side of the wall (and probably also plastic surface mount) could one use singles between them (might be easier to thread through the remaining space etc?).

All the best ..

T i m

[Owain]

No problem putting an adjacent FCU then.

Only if you used proper plastic conduit through the wall. It would have to be mechanically coupled to the boxes as well.

Owain