What electrical work are you allowed to do in your own home?

as a DIY or homeowner I think it's important to know a little bit about the electrics in your property and what you can and can't do with it by law so today I'm going to explain all of that to you [Music] thank you before going through what you as a homeowner are allowed to do with the electrics in your own home let's go through some basics of your typical UK home electrical distribution firstly the incoming voltage of electrics in the UK is now 230 volts not 240 volts having said that it's 230 volts plus 10 or minus six percent so there's a range there that also covers 240. the 230 standard is now been accepted around the world so equipment can be used in all kinds of countries that also use this type of voltage but don't worry anything with two faulty volts is still going to work so before we go through this let's go outside and see where the electricity comes into the house or should I say into my property because incoming supplies generally these days end up going into a plastic cabinet before they come into the house the older supplies will go straight into the house so this is what mine looks like this is the ink coming cable coming out from the road and the first thing it goes through is a big chunky 100 amp fuse because I've got 100 amp Supply on this house from here it goes into the meter this is my meter and from there exits a meter and then goes into this isolation type switch which you may not find that you've got this but obviously my electricity company decided to put this on if I flip those switches and everything Downstream in the house will be isolated from here you can see the towels going into basically another similar switch this is my switch this time which will isolate the house fully before going off through this cable into the house now some of these are owned by me this is owned by me and the fuse and the meter and I I only assume this because it's obviously the electricity company is all owned by the power distribution Network or the company that is actually supplying your electricity so anyway from here we have to go to the distribution board so the supply then comes into here which is a consumer unit or sometimes called a distribution board or even a fuse box although these days it doesn't have fuses in now modern ones like this are actually made out of metal so it doesn't melt in a fire and in slightly older properties all of this will be made out of plastic which is still fine to have but if you do have one that still looks like it's got fuses in it rather than breakers like this and it's made out of Baker light or something looking sort of pre-war then I would highly suggest it's definitely well out of date and I would recommend looking to get it changed and upgraded the point of this box is to split the incoming Supply into lots of different individual circuits that radiate all around the house to feed things like lights and sockets and individual items like maybe an oven or one I've got on here which is the garage and workshop or even maybe an out building or something like that inside the unit there'll be a number of Market Breakers called mcb's or miniature circuit breakers each one for a circuit in your property although you can sort of look at them as modern day fuses they're more sensitive than a fuse and they'll trip quick and obviously with these sort of switches they can be reset as well each one of these will relate to a different circuit around the home and although all of them will be 230 volts each one is designed to take a different load so for instance a lighting circuit like this one here because lights don't take very much they never will do is on a six amp Supply where something a little bit heavier like my electric hob here is on a 32 amp Supply these Breakers are here to protect the cables and the insulations downstream of this all around your home not necessarily here to protect you this is to protect the actual installation and the cables on each circuit will be sized to be able to cope with the maximum load on on each one of these so if anything happens and the circuit is overloaded this breaker is going to trip before the cable Downstream of this starts melting and going well wrong also in modern consumer units for your safety there's another cutout system called rcd or residual current device in here I've got two half the circuits are protected by one and the other half of the circuits are protected by the other you can also get them on individual circuits as well but that's not what I've got here rcds are there to protect you they constantly monitor the current flowing through the circuits they're on and if it detects electricity flowing down an unintended path let's say me for instance it will switch that circuit off and the electricity incredibly quickly significantly reducing the risk of death apparently so some circuits will go direct to an appliance a bit like an oven and other circuits let's say a circuit that feeds sockets around the house may go from one to another let me show you what I mean so this is a sketch of my consumer unit and this is my oven and I've got a single cable coming out of here it might go through just a bit of a switch first and then into the oven so these are my lights and I could have a circuit that goes to a switch and then goes from one light to another light to another light that's no problem at all or I could have a circuit where I've got a number of sockets and the cable could go from one socket to another to another it could actually daisy chain from all of them and then eventually end up all the way back at the original breaker this is what we call a ring circuit because it basically goes in a ring and this is one way of sharing current so this this socket here the current may be using both cables it's just a way of cutting down on the thickness of the cables so what are we as homeowners allowed to do within the electrical systems of our own homes well there's a document here that will give you all the answers and it's called part P of the UK building regulations 2010 and I've put a link to this document in the description below this document describes what it covers and what you can and can't do in your own home depending on whether it's called notifiable these are just applicable to England and Wales only so if you're in Scotland the rules might be slightly different it if the work is notifiable what it tells you is under these regulations it needs to be notified to the building Control Authority which essentially means a DIY or non-qualified electrician can't legally carry out the work and if you do you risk a fine of up to five thousand pound but more importantly if there's any problems and any damage on your property in the future you'll find that most insurance companies then won't pay out on any claims and also when you come to sell the property you could find you're having a problem because you then can't prove that all these installations you've made have been done properly so let's run through what you can and can't do according to our building regulations here in the UK starting with the consumer unit well with the consumer unit you can't do anything you're not allowed to make any adjustments changes additions or even if you put in a new circuit by definition they've got to come back into here so you're just not allowed to work in it so don't even bother don't even think about taking the the cover off although you can't add a new circuit you are allowed to extend an existing Circuit by adding a Spur to a lighting circuit or a Spur to a ring main like I did here when I added a Spur from this ring main socket through the wall to the other side I'll put a link to this video in the description below you can also wire in an electric gate or a garage door for instance into an isolator switch but only if you have an isolator switch already installed you're not allowed to install that isolator switch because that would also mean that you're installing a new circuit the good news is that just about all electrical maintenance work is not notifiable therefore you're allowed to carry it out yourself this can be replacing switches sockets light fittings any like-for-like repairs or even adding low voltage lighting off of an existing 240 volt circuit another area where you're not allowed to carry out any work as a diyer is what the regulations call a special location and that's essentially either in or around a shower or a bath or a room contained in a swimming pool or a sauna interestingly special locations used to include work in the kitchen and outside in the garden but those areas have now been removed so installing an outside socket for instance is now allowed but after having said all of that one of the problems that we have as DIY is is not necessarily doing the work most electrical work all you need is a screwdriver and a pair of pliers but it's checking the work afterwards and I don't mean checking to see if this socket's going to fall off the wall I mean electrical testing to make sure you've still got continuity in your ring main still got the right values in your Earth cable and all of that to do that you're going to need some fairly expensive equipment and more importantly you're going to need the training and skill to be able to use that equipment properly and understand the results so just because part P says you're allowed to do something and not tell anyone doesn't necessarily mean to say you should it's your responsibility to make sure that any electrical work is still done to the correct standards and it's safe and you don't put your life at risk or those around you so what I would say is only carry out any electrical work if you're 100 confident of your own abilities so I hope this video has been useful and I will see you next time

Channel: Proper DIY

Views: 564,302

Keywords: consumer unit, rewire a house, rewiring a house uk, change a consumer unit, consumer unit installation, house wiring, house rewiring uk, house wiring installation, diy rewire house uk, add a socket to a ring main, home electrics explained, home electrical basics, home electrics uk, low voltage lighting installation, low voltage lighting wiring

Id: C6Ua77yewdY

Length: 10min 38sec (638 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 06 2023