# 18th Edition wiring question



## GM (8 Jan 2021)

I'm currently renovating my detached garage come man cave as part of a lock down project. Question is does the power and lighting cable need to be fire rated, or standard 2.5/1.5 twin and earth flex? 

Nothing too complicated, 3 RCD power sockets and a 2 way lighting switch. I'm a retired chippy but I've done quite a bit of electrical work in my kitchen/office fitting days years ago before Part P came in, so not up to date with current regs.

I'll get an electrician to connect up to a new consumer unit and sign it off ( hopefully ).

Thanks in advance!


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## cosmicbike (8 Jan 2021)

2.5 T&E is fine, flat as opposed to flex. Clip direct if you want to, personally in garages I always run in plastic conduit. Part P obviously applies, hope you find a friendly sparky.


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## irw (8 Jan 2021)

The domestic sparkys who rewired my house just used T&E for the socket in the garage, although that will have been in 17th Ed. times, so rules may well have changed. In saying that, over the course of making some modifications around the house the last couple of years, I've also found a number of poor terminations where they've just clamped the screw down tightly through the insulation, and other shoddy workmanship, so I'd be inclined not to take what I've seen as gospel!


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## T4tomo (8 Jan 2021)

within the garage can be standard flex. 

there are more regs on the wire between your house circuit board and the garage circuit board and it particularly the physical protection it needs as you run it from building to building - check with a sparky


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## GM (8 Jan 2021)

Thanks for the replies chaps. Flat 2.5 T&E it is then, but do the clips need to be metal fire rated or standard plastic ones, cables will be behind the wall lining and above ceiling insulation boards ?


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## cosmicbike (9 Jan 2021)

Normal clips. Make sure you have RCD protection on all circuits, one of the key changes from 17th to 18th Edition. I await a change to bring in AFDD's in the Regs, something that came out of the Grenfell investigation. Already most of the big manufacturers offer them.


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## SkipdiverJohn (9 Jan 2021)

irw said:


> In saying that, over the course of making some modifications around the house the last couple of years, I've also found a number of poor terminations where they've just clamped the screw down tightly through the insulation, and other shoddy workmanship, so I'd be inclined not to take what I've seen as gospel!



So much for all the crap about "always leave electrics to the professionals" !  
Poor terminations are a significant cause of things overheating. Any time I've needed to join incoming and outgoing conductors together, such as in a ring main, I've twisted the ends of the bare wires together before inserting them in the terminals and tightening them. But then if I'm doing something for myself I'm not in a hurry and I want it done to the best standard I can achieve. 
I know of a development where the sparkys just fabricated all the testing measurements without actually doing any testing at all. They knew roughly what the right numbers should be on a good installation so that's what they entered on the certificates and signed it off. The bloke doing it didn't even have any test equipment with him.


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## GM (9 Jan 2021)

cosmicbike said:


> Normal clips. Make sure you have RCD protection on all circuits, one of the key changes from 17th to 18th Edition. I await a change to bring in AFDD's in the Regs, something that came out of the Grenfell investigation. Already most of the big manufacturers offer them.




Thanks for that info. I'll have to have a read up on AFDD's. Interesting stuff, I suppose it's a good idea to keep ahead of the regs.


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## sheddy (9 Jan 2021)

As you know, the new consumer unit now has a steel enclosure..


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