Adding sockets to ring main/add another ring

Bill Payer · 2009-10-19T11:07:16+00:00

Our house was built around the early to mid 60s (so has "modern" PVC twin & earth cabling) and has just one ring main feeding the whole house. We want to add in some extra sockets but obviously I don't want to overload the one circuit so I've had an idea that I want to run past you peeps here.Most family/friends houses seem to be wired with an upstairs ring and a downstairs ring. My idea is to go to all the sockets in the upstairs rooms and basically pull the cables out of the sockets, back down to under the floorboards and joint them there (either with "traditional" junction boxes or with crimps/heatshrink sleeve), so that the continuity of the ring is preserved but it is now just serving the downstairs sockets, then run a new ring for the upstairs sockets, and adding new sockets to each ring where needed.Is this OK?TIA,Bill

Oct 19, 2009 43 Replies

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NT 16 years ago

I dont know why one would think that.

Or why doing it from new is meeting current requirements but an expanded old ring isnt.

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Jim 16 years ago

Thanks, that's very helpful. The 50 metre number came from:

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"The length of cable used in a ring circuit is limited to 50 metres for circuits protected by an MCB."

If that number is wrong then that means we have plenty to play with and there's no sense in coming up with ad-hoc solutions.

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John Rumm 16 years ago

Not sure where they got that 50m figure, but its definitely not right. From the horses mouth:

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Bill Payer 16 years ago

Thanks John, and indeed everyone who contributed to the thread. I've now got a way forward :)

Bill

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