Graham. wrote:

On 17/05/2019 17:24, David wrote:
Checking my thinking for any gotchas.

I am reorganising the office and putting a couple of kitchen drawer units
with a desktop across up against one wall.

There is only one double socket at the moment and this is on the opposite
wall.

My plan is to take power to the wall under the desktop then fit some
switched 13A sockets into the desktop itself, instead of having several
sockets in the wall below and distribution boards feeding from the desktop
down to them.

Now it looks fairly simple to put a switched fused spur into a box in the
wall below the desk, then just wire from the box to the sockets on top.

It seems that the electrical load would be no more than having extension
leads with loads of sockets.

Is there a downside?

Apart from one switch taking out the whole desktop instead of a couple of
switched sockets?

It looks neater, but probably far more expensive through using boxes and
switched sockets instead of the 6 way extension leads that I currently use.

I suppose one downside is the temptation for me (or another) to plug
another multi-socket extension lead into the desktop socket, putting more
load on the spur than you would get if plugged directly into a 13A ring
main. A bit like the traditional cascade of extension leads beloved by
computer users.

The alternative would be to extend the 13A ring main to the desktop but
I'm not sure quite how to wire that.


I would not mount 13A sockets on a desktop computer. You could use C13
to C14 cables and then have a C13 Power Distribution Unit which would be
smaller than a row of 13Amp sockets.

We used UPSs with that socketery when I was working. The problem with
them is all the wall-warts for your routers & switches etc, so they
ended up plugged into raw mains.

I use a standard cheap 4 way extension lead and replace the plug with
the male version of C13/4 whichever it is. I then mark the socket
strip with lots of permanent marker to remind me these are for small
loads connected to the UPS.

--

Roger Hayter