Adding a double socket to socket

[mr rob]

Hello all
Whats the best way to add a double socket off of this? this is a double socket in the hall, and i want to drill directly through to the other side of the wall for another double socket. I didnt add this to the house, probably built with the house

 

[sparkwright]

Firstly, what size fuse or circuit breaker protects this socket?

 

[Taylortwocities]

Whssign

• Taylortwocities
• 16 Jul 2016

What he said

If you not sure, we can tell you how to find out.

 

[mr rob]

If you are asking about the consumer unit, this is fed (among all sockets) by a 32A fuse.

 

[EFLImpudence]

In that case it would appear that the socket is already on a 'spur' (branch off the ring circuit).

The regulations state you may not add another socket without fitting a fuse on the spur before the existing socket.

 

[mr rob]

really? oh. so how does one tell if it is a spur? like i said this is most probably part of original build of house, and all sockets appear to be off this 32A fuse

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

If it were in the ring final it would have two sets of connections; one from the previous socket in the ring and one going on to the next one. So it must be a spur, connected (hopefully) to one of the accessories in the ring (which would therefore likely have three sets of wires).

 

[mr rob]

ok if that is the case
to add a double socket, with plugs that will have fuses in them. I need to have some sort of fused unit before it?

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

You really need to find the socket feeding the one pictured, so you can decide if it really is a ring. If it is, then probably replace the existing socket with an fcu and use that to feed both existing and new sockets.

 

[mr rob]

hm but buried into the wall, so not sure i could figure it out

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

It's a bit of logic combined with a multimeter...

All wires in the wall come out at another accessory somewhere. You can usually see in which direction the cables are going away from an accessory.

 

[rsgaz]

Open up some nearby sockets. As Detlef says, you should find one with three cables instead of (the normal) two.

If you find all the nearby sockets only have one cable also, is there a socket directly above this one in the room upstairs?

 

[333rocky333]

Though unfortunately there is always a possibility that a J/B was used under the floor and your hunt in the sockets may be in vain.

Another option is downrate the MCB to 20 amp

 

[mr rob]

crikey knows how this was put together!
so the socket i want to extend may now be a spur. The wire looks like it is coming from the left of the socket.
There are no sockets to the left. About 6m away on the left is the MCU in the garage.
There is a strange wire behind a metal shield in the wall that would look like it feeds this socket, but doesnt seem to carry live.


There is a double above it, but this (pic below here)..

has only one wire into it too. From below.


There is a socket in the garage 1m away opposite wall, that is a ring. But doesnt appear to branch to the one I want too - both the wire come out of the ceiling.

I dont know!

 

[DetlefSchmitz]

One approach; not totally correct, but pragmatically defensible, is replace the existing socket with an fcu and use that to feed both (newly positioned) existing socket and new socket.
Either the existing socket is a valid spur, in which case this is correct. Or it is a spur from a spur, in which case you haven't made the situation worse than it was.