Spurring Socket - Twin & Earth

opalfruit

Hi all, about to spur a socket in the house and want to confirm that I have the right cable. Its twin & earth, 2.5mm - will be used mostly for a small light & radio in our kitchen. Does it sound right?

Also recommend somewhere online I can pick up more twin & earth in bulk as there will be further spurring in another 2 rooms later on!.

Ta ver much

DublinDilbert

opalfruit wrote: »

Hi all, about to spur a socket in the house and want to confirm that I have the right cable. Its twin & earth, 2.5mm - will be used mostly for a small light & radio in our kitchen. Does it sound right?

Also recommend somewhere online I can pick up more twin & earth in bulk as there will be further spurring in another 2 rooms later on!.

Ta ver much

Yep 2.5 T & E would be standard... Adding an extra socket shouldn't be a problem if its a radial circuit, you have to be a bit more carefull if you have a ring circuit...

Another trick is to check if there's a socket on the other side of the wall where you want one, as its usually fairly easy to put two sockets back to back....

I've never bought cable online... in a wholesalers a 100m roll of 2.5 T&E is about €55 + VAT. Some places like B&Q sell it in smaller rolls (eg 5 or 10m), but they work out quite expensive. Also the likes of woodies/athlantic will sell by the meter again works out dear, but it depends on how much you need!

If your looking for a 100m roll you won't do much better than an electrical wholesaler....

Nuravictus

opalfruit wrote: »

Hi all, about to spur a socket in the house and want to confirm that I have the right cable. Its twin & earth, 2.5mm - will be used mostly for a small light & radio in our kitchen. Does it sound right?

Also recommend somewhere online I can pick up more twin & earth in bulk as there will be further spurring in another 2 rooms later on!.

Ta ver much

If you are adding more sockets just make sure its not a ring. I suppose the best way would be to look in your fuseboard & see if any of the socket MCB's have 2 Brown Cables going into it. In my experience in doing houses the Kitchen is normally broken over 2 radial circuits (Left & Right) so you should be grand.

Stoner

Nuravictus wrote: »

If you are adding more sockets just make sure its not a ring. .

out of interest why ? the possible load on the ring ?

also OP there are a list of wholesalers here

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055193263

Nuravictus

Stoner wrote: »

out of interest why ? the possible load on the ring ?

also OP there are a list of wholesalers here

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055193263

Incase he breaks it & gives himself two radial circuits on one MCB which would be overrated.

Thou braking it would be hard enough since there is no end of line so therefore he would have to remove a leg of the circuit to turn it into two radials.

Stoner wrote: »

out of interest why ? the possible load on the ring ?

also OP there are a list of wholesalers here

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055193263

Incase he breaks it & gives himself two radial circuits on one MCB which would be overrated.

Thou braking it would be hard enough since there is no end of line so therefore he would have to remove a leg of the circuit to turn it into two radials.

Opalfruit I am bored so here a how too for you

Ring, (Turn the Power off)

1: Turn off the power
2: Now a Ring does not have a end of line opalfruit, so every socket will have two cables in it so this might confuse you & you might try commit a crime by putting 3 cables in one socket.
3: What you want to do is this, open the socket neariest to where you want the new socket, now give the leg which is between where the new socket location is a pull/push, what you want to check is that its free & can move. Once you have done that & you are sure it you will be able to pull a cable in then do the following.
4: Disconnect the leg at the socket you opened, cut the live(brown) & neutral(blue) off & remove any pvc on the earth. Now get the new cable & do the same. What you want to do now is wrap the earths arround each other so that you can pull the cable in on your own, make sure its really tight. A good pilars will do that for you. Make sure the copper ends are not facing the direction you are pulling as they may get caught.
5: Now pull in the new cable to the the other socket, you will now have a lenght of old 2.5 keep it has it can be handly for later.
6: Now you will have a cable hanging out of the old socket, what you want to do is now is get the cable & measure it. Make sure you use right angles because thats a Industry standard & its safe pratice. Now when you have the cable measured cut it & leave it there.
7: Get the cable off the drum & try fish it to the new socket location, if it wont fish for you dont worry, Get the old 2.5 & what you want to do is get the bare earth with your pilars & pull. The bare earth will split the cable & you now have a handy fishing tool. Bend the end & try fish that & tape the cable to the earth & pull it in.
8: Now you should have 2 cables at 3 different sockets when you add one new socket. Now comes the connection part. If you have any slack remake the connections on the old 2.5 cables since its bad practice to use the same connections twice. Also make sure you earth the back box if you are using one.


Note: I have a feeling this new socket will be surface, if its surface use NYMJ which is better for surface work has its stronger insulation than 2.5 T&E.
Note 2: The process is the same for a Radial, all you are doing is spliting the circuit mate.
Note 3: You will need to buy earth sheve if you are using T&E since in these days bare earths are not really acceptable practice.
Note 4: If you are adding the circuit to the end of line of a Radial Circuit please ignore most of the above :P. I hope that helps opalfruit.

Rememeber to try keep everything at right angles & to try remake the old connects when you are connecting the new cables. Pull on your connections before you screw the socket back up so you are happy there is a good connection. Then you can tell your Girlfriend you didnt need any sparks to help ya :P Let me know if its surface or in plastic conduit. Also your not allowed put sockets too close to the sink or cooker one of the lads here will let you know the correct legal distance as I dont know it atm.

enmac

Cheers Nuravictus,

Now we're all confused