Ive currently just knocked the partition down in one of my bedrooms to make 2 rooms in to 1 large room , the plasterboard wall partition I knocked through had 2 wall sockets on it so I now want to put these next to each other on the outer wall , my house was built around 1900 and has plaster walls so whats the procedure for putting these sockets into my solid outer wall , do you just chisel the shape of the socket into the wall , then drill them flush into the wall ?

There are many ways to mount sockets. From surface to flush and often required the removing of some material to let them in flush. However although there are tools to remove the material often it's a case of a cold chisel and careful work. Getting the base level is not easy and I have seen many ways to fill and repair where the hole is not quite as wanted. Including filling with plaster pushing into place and returning next day to finish.
There are three important things.
1) Not to significantly reduce strength of wall.
2) To make it so socket will not come out.
3) Ensure no foreign matter can enter the enclosure which could damage it. i.e. water.
But it's mainly common sense rather than a list of rules. Cables must run horizontal or vertical diagonal is not permitted and where there is a final ring the ring must be maintained as a ring. Once completed then the standard tests to ensure the ring still exists and the earth loop impedance etc is still within limits of course will need testing and the forms completed and filed.

I would be wondering, being a victorian house, whether the external brickwork would be single skin..??

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I Know it says I'm On-line, but I might have just left myself logged in, whilst I'm out....

You doi realise you have to install a flush metal box behind the socket dont you ? Basically this is smaller than the socket and allows you to plaster upto it to make it a better finish , your socket then screws onto this box and sits flush against the wall.


Nick

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If it isnt broke dont bloody touch it until it bloody well is and if it is broke then make drawing of the connections before you remove the broken one and replace with a new one LoL

Metal boxes in brick can be a bit iffy, especially in a solid wall if the brick tends to be a somewhat damp. Nylon or plastic boxes may at times be a better approach, or surface mounting the box on a pattress even though the cable may be buried.

Where do you get these flush mounted plastic boxes john ?? Never ever seen one used on any job i have been on , Got any links ??


Nick

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If it isnt broke dont bloody touch it until it bloody well is and if it is broke then make drawing of the connections before you remove the broken one and replace with a new one LoL

Some varieties of plasterboard boxes can be quite satisfactorily used as flush mounting boxes in a hole in a solid wall. Don't degenerate into a festering, rusty mess like galvanised ones seem to do all too rapidly. Designs of drywall mounting boxes vary quite a bit and some are useless for that purpose.

With respect John, plasterboard boxes are so called because of their use in stud walls, they are not designed or tested to be used buried in a brick wall. not .Ever wondered why they do not have fixing holes in them ??? Thats because you dont screw them

If I ever went to a job took the socket off the wall and saw a dry lining box, I would :-

1. Laugh my socks off

2. Be concerned about the state of the rest of the houses wiring as obviously a DIYer has struck and who knows what else they might have done.


Nick

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If it isnt broke dont bloody touch it until it bloody well is and if it is broke then make drawing of the connections before you remove the broken one and replace with a new one LoL

Ever wonder what function apostrophes serve?


You're at perfect liberty so to do.


Again you're at perfect liberty so to do. However you might be better advised to think of other possibilities as well.

Time was when most sparkies could think for themselves and come up with an answer appropriate to the needs of the situation.

There's not always an ideal box for any given situation and certainly when I find a steel box with rusty excrescences and "fixed" in position by the remains of steel screws I form the view that perhaps the sparky concerned did not use the most appropriate of boxes or fixings.

Many materials can quite appropriately be drilled providing due attention be paid to spreading the load around the holes where necessary.

This is not the time or the place to have a slanging match. I have made my oppinions clear and all you can do is extract the urine from a grammatical error .
Your oppinion is also clear so we shall leave it at that . In 23 years of being a sparks , I have never ever seen a dry lining box used as a flush box and it makes you wonder Hmm why would that be ??? I will leave you to ponder that .

regards

Nick

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If it isnt broke dont bloody touch it until it bloody well is and if it is broke then make drawing of the connections before you remove the broken one and replace with a new one LoL

Precisely. No need for World War 3. So it would be helpful if you were to state your opinions in a non-abusive manner.

Not a grammatical error at all, but one of punctuation. However if you ridicule the use of a slightly unconventional use of existing electrical accessories, while still being within code, it might be expected that you would respect the rules of punctuation and also those of spelling. The Ultimate Handyman system even flags up errors of spelling so that none of us need have incorrect spelling unless we ignore what has been clearly flagged up as an error.

I haven't the foggiest idea as to what your range of experience is, merely its duration. As for myself, I've been involved in maintenance work for more than twice that period, both in the UK and in North America. My first question when I see something which appears unconventional is "Why did they do it that way?" The answer is not necessarily "They're stupid" or "It was just a kludge" -- there often turns out to have been a very good reason, even if I haven't seen it immediately.

I haven't the foggiest idea as to what your range of experience is, merely its duration. As for myself, I've been involved in maintenance work for more than twice that period, both in the UK and in North America. My first question when I see something which appears unconventional is "Why did they do it that way?" The answer is not necessarily "They're stupid" or "It was just a kludge" -- there often turns out to have been a very good reason, even if I haven't seen it immediately.

Incidentally, of all the accessory enclosures I've seen in fifty years of working with installations of many different sorts, the very poorest have been the thermoplastic enclosures used in the UK for surface-mounting of electrical accessories. Although I don't care for many of the wiring practices in North America it might be said that awkward though some of their back-boxes are to work with, they're versatile and, unlike in the UK, they are almost always mounted in a manner which brings them precisely level to the surface of the wall in which they're mounted, rather than the mess you very often find in the UK where the back-box is often far below the surface of the wall, leaving one wondering whether in fact it's serving all that much of a useful function at all. What's more, one rarely, if ever, sees there the untidy and unsafe situation which seems to be the norm here with regard to the mounting of ceiling light fittings: a proper and securely-mounted ceiling box is the norm there and is safe for suspension of even a heavy fitting and the use of a suspension flex to take the weight of the fitting is something I've never seen there.

What I'm suggesting is that we all need to be challenged. Two of the most brilliant men I have known, both of them now long-dead -- one of them one of the most senior electrical engineers in what's now Scottish and Southern, the other a practical sparky with his own very successful business, came up with the same idea with regard to electrical heating systems and it involved throwing out the capacity table provided by all manufacturers because they saw that the parameters underlying these tables were actually fatally flawed in the real world. A third was the former chief engineer at the massive Powell River generating station system in British Columbia, a late outpost of 50Hz generation in North America; he was the individual who in the mid-1970s first drew my attention to how much in the realm of electrical equipment was produced on the basis of a "suck it and see" approach. Very intelligent and very successful men, but all of them men who could -- and did -- think for themselves.