On 26/11/2013 00:22, Bill wrote:
Right,

1st hurdle crossed, RCBOs and main switch purchased, well sort of
anyway. I went into the wholesaler that I use for work and ordered
them, I thought that I made it obvious that they were for me and not the
company. The fact that I haggled the guy down on cost should have given
it away as well!! Last week our storeman asked had I been buying some
strange electrical bits as he had just had a delivery with just "Bill"
as the order number. The so and so's had billed them to the company,
luckily we are quite small and have a very understanding accounts
department!

Any way, as I recall someone commenting on, my first problem is going to
be space, if it had been a new install I would probably have managed it,
but as it is it's going to be a very tight squeeze. So I think the
Andrew Gabriel method of having a separate box, as per famous cu1.jpg
photo, is called for, except that I will end up having 2 boxes, one
above and one below the CU. This is beginning to sound messy, but
there are cables coming from above and below the CU and not enough slack
to pull enough through to gain any extra length. I'm fortunate that the
CU is mounted on a board with a few inches gap behind it and can easily
move the board forward to give more space without it looking out of
place. This will also allow me to put the 2 boxes further back than the
CU and then board over them.

Sometimes its a case of needing to carefully identify the wires already
there, disconnect everything and start again neatly dressing (and
extending if required) the wires...

Adding a RCBO to an already full box can be difficult. (when I replaced
my CUs in similar circumstance - I did not spend that much time making
it particularly pretty, which I came to regret later when adding an
RCBO. Fortunately it went in, but not in the position I would have
chosen normally).

Yes I could crimp leads and use one box of terminals, I use crimps
frequently for lower voltages and I'm quite happy with them, but for
some reason just don't fancy the idea here.

You could also use Wago terminals - but to be fair crimps are smaller
and slimmer when space is important.

Of course the short days and long dark nights are just the right time of
year to do this, I'm not known for my forward planning :-)

Head torch, spare batts, and battery power tools that are *charged* ;-)

So, the one technical question that I have. I would imagine that 4mm
singles should be adequate to link the DIN terminals to the RCBOs,
certainly OK for lighting, but should I be thinking of 6mm for some of
the others?

IME RCBOs will come with the required fly lead to connect back to the
neutral bus bar.


--
Cheers,

John.

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