We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the cupboards
will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend is
concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?

John wrote:
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the cupboards
will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend is
concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?

Is your friend a perrenial worrier, nay-sayer and general doom merchant?

Chipboard isn't particularly flammable and CUs shouldn't even get warm
let alone hot enough to melt or burst into flames just because they're
in a box.

--
Scott

Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

On 16/01/15 17:02, John wrote:
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the cupboards
will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend is
concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?


It's fine and it's not making anything worse.

On 16/01/15 17:27, Scott M wrote:
John wrote:
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like
to box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are
made of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the
cupboards will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend
is concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?

Is your friend a perrenial worrier, nay-sayer and general doom merchant?

Chipboard isn't particularly flammable and CUs shouldn't even get warm
let alone hot enough to melt or burst into flames just because they're
in a box.


Although a few do.

However, they're going to combust and drop flaming molten plastic either
way so nothing much lost. In fact the cupboard (even chip) may contain
the fire a little longer giving more time to escape assuming smoke
detectors still notice.

On Fri, 16 Jan 2015 17:27:59 +0000, Scott M wrote:

John wrote:
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the
cupboards will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend
is concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?

Is your friend a perrenial worrier, nay-sayer and general doom merchant?

Only when it suits him! He doesn't believe in using C/H inhibitor as he
thinks it's snake-oil ;-)

Chipboard isn't particularly flammable and CUs shouldn't even get warm
let alone hot enough to melt or burst into flames just because they're
in a box.

My thoughts exactly. Thanks.

On Fri, 16 Jan 2015 17:28:22 +0000, Tim Watts wrote:

On 16/01/15 17:02, John wrote:
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the
cupboards will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend
is concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?


It's fine and it's not making anything worse.

Thanks. If anything, as this all is above a sink, it is making things
better.

"John" wrote in message
...
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the cupboards
will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend is
concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?


Same cupboard? How close in the CU to the gas meter. There must be a
distance of 150mm between a CU and a gas meter unless separated by a non
combustible material.

The relevant regs are BS 6891 but the BS7671 regs that I know only make a
passing reference to this (OSG pg 18)

--
Adam

On Fri, 16 Jan 2015 19:41:13 +0000, ARW wrote:


Same cupboard? How close in the CU to the gas meter. There must be a
distance of 150mm between a CU and a gas meter unless separated by a non
combustible material.

The relevant regs are BS 6891 but the BS7671 regs that I know only make
a passing reference to this (OSG pg 18)

The gas meter is outside. I wish the electric one was too!

On 16/01/2015 19:41, ARW wrote:

The relevant regs are BS 6891 but the BS7671 regs that I know only make
a passing reference to this (OSG pg 18)

Accessibility and maintainability are the main points. The innards of
the CU need to be accessible for testing and maintenance, and the main
switch must always be accessible for emergency use. The meter also must
be accessible for reading (obviously) and for replacement from time to time.

If the cupboard carcass is fairly easy to remove from the wall, e.g. for
a CU or meter change, then there'll be no great problem. But if it
becomes built-in to the point where it would be hard to remove and
access is difficult I'd consider it unacceptable.

--
Andy

"John" wrote in message
...
We have the meter and CU exposed, bare on the wall, and I would like to
box them in. I plan to use (backless) kitchen wall units which are made
of chipboard or MDF. No need to touch any of the wiring, as the cupboards
will simply be mounted over the gear.

I have looked and cannot find any reason not to do this but my friend is
concerned that there might be an additional fire risk. This seems
unlikely as the CU (Wylex) is made from cheap thermoplastic. Is this
allowed under electrical regulations?

They are often concealed in this way.
Just mind you don't drill any cables when fixing it.

AMD3 requires that CU installed after 01-Jan-2016 be...
- Constructed of non-combustible material (eg, metal top & bot)
OR
- Enclosed within a non-combustible enclosure (with access to equipment)

An example of a suitable enclosure material would be Plasterboard or Cement Board, Class-0 foam for the seal. There is no mention of IP rating, so cables could exit through a Class-0 foam lined hole (watch grouping) or intumescent seal oblong suitably positioned.


A hysterical response, frankly, to a sharp increase in fires reported by the FBU - most of which of doubtful coding and in any case a metal box isn't going to make a huge difference. If you want to counter imbecile screw tightening you fit a 300ma time delayed RCD upstream (integrated into smart meters, giving a viable benefit to their ridiculous nationwide cost) to give some useful ACTIVE fire protection and perhaps mandate a smoke alarm right by the CU or even in the same enclosure if applicable.

As it stands you need do nothing, and the industry is supposedly going to code all the old CU as "C3" rather than C1/C2 which means "fix".

It is suspected some CU may have been manufactured with a plastic base which excluded fire retardant additives. This is a particularly onerous omission where the CU claimed otherwise - re trade descriptions act. If this is the case, the industry JPEL64 / ESF should have effected a product recall - instead of "whole nation has unfit for purpose CU" when the bulk of the plant uses plastic CU. UK CU were supposed to pass the 650oC glow wire test (I think only 1 of 5 tested did) and incredibly they rejected 960oC plastic which is routinely used elsewhere.

I personally think non-FR CU should be recalled, and if you want to do something about CU fire risk - fit a smoke & upstream fire-RCD (time delay 300ma). A few people used to do just that in timber frame workshops with heavy draw equipment, small price for a bit more fire protection.

If you can make any enclosure lift-off via lift-off brackets (like toilet service panels) or instead machine screw fitted into boiler-rawlplugs (M6/M8 screw fits into steel tube into plastic rawling) then that is ideal.

The removable screw I refer to (machine screw into tube into rawlplug) is called a Rigifix. It is useful for spanning insulation, or where you want a cupboard to be easily removed without the fastening becoming loose from doing so.

You do not want a cupboard falling on the CU etc, many are little more 1-2 millimetres of High Impact (ha!) PolyStyrene (HIPS, marked PS) and pretty pathetic compared to the thicker stuff MEMera & Merlin Gerin etc turned out.

DNO can be quite crabby and refuse to work without sufficient access (they do work live at times, so somewhat understandable).

On 17/01/2015 23:27, wrote:

The removable screw I refer to (machine screw into tube into rawlplug) is called a Rigifix.

These sound useful, does anyone have experience with them?

I'm needing to put up some Spur shelving on 12mm plasterboard on 2x2
studs on a brick wall. I've tried long frame fixings in the past but
they don't seem to expand enough to grip very well. The shelves will go
in a 1.5 metre wide alcove where I would need 5 uprights if I screwed
them to each stud. This seems rather a lot but if I missed out one stud
I'd have a rather long span of about 800mm. If I'm not constrained to
the stud locations I could get away with 4 uprights and spans of about
370mm. The shelving will be almost wall to ceiling and each upright and
associated bracket will cost about £15 to £20 so there's quite a saving
in reducing the count by one.

The pictures on the Rigifix website http://buyrigifixonline.co.uk/
look like they'll be strong enough to support lots of books and the
YouTube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaYfs3lr1jI shows they
need lots of torque to get the metal sleeve in so they should grip well.
But I'm wondering if they will be long enough to provide enough purchase
into the bricks 3.5 inches back from the plasterboard surface.

--
Mike Clarke

On Sunday, January 18, 2015 at 11:11:51 AM UTC, Mike Clarke wrote:
into the bricks 3.5 inches back from the plasterboard surface.

Too far, they are limited to 50mm.

A bit odd because current BR is 65mm Celotex (for new build, renovation can vary based on many factors re 5% rule, technical, less on walls & more on roof, min U value etc).

You will need to find the studs unfortunately - or fix new horizontal studs through into brick. 3.5 inch is quite an unsupported distance re bending moment.

They do otherwise work ok (over 50mm). Not made by fischer re finish/precision, but work ok (then again fischer screws tend to shear as too hard I've found, might be just me).

On 18/01/2015 11:28, wrote:

On Sunday, January 18, 2015 at 11:11:51 AM UTC, Mike Clarke wrote:
into the bricks 3.5 inches back from the plasterboard surface.

Too far, they are limited to 50mm.

Oops, typo on my part. That should have been 2.5 in. not 3.5 but still
too far.

--
Mike Clarke