Help with bathroom electrics

[bitchain]

Hi all,

This weekend I am attempting some electrics myself in the bathroom.

- Fitting 3 12V low voltage IP65 fire rated downlights
- Moving shaver power point
- Adding 2 mirror light mains power points

I could really do with a little advice.

1) Downlights

I have bought the appropriate housings and transfomers. I am going to cut 4 holes in the bathroom ceiling (2.7m high so out of zone 0). At present 1 switch outside the bathroom controls 2 mains powered downlights. The 2 downlights are linked together with a single cable.

What I intend to do is give each of the new 12v downlights 1 junction box and a transformer (this is how the guy did our living room). I would think i just need to link the 4 junction boxes together and put the live cable into one of them. Sound about right?

2) Moving shaver power point

This is on the mirror wall and we want to move it to the door wall, still within correct zone. Is it best to reuse the power cable used for the old socket and route it horizontally to the new wall through the stud wall notches etc?? Is it advistable to drill cable holes horizontally in the stud woodwork? Or shouold I be looking to come all the way down from the ceiling for this?

3) The hardest one for me - Adding 2 mirror lights.

There is currently no power for these other than perhaps the shaver point power which is on the same wall. But I need to put these 2 wall lights onto the light switch that controls the current ceiling lights BUT independently controlled. The light switch outside the door is on roughly the level that I want these wall lights but a different wall. It is therefore a good idea to run the cable horizontally through the stud partition and wood work? That would logically make sense to me as being the simplest. Do I just connect a new cable to the switch box (with a double switch) and run that to the 2 wall lights?

I know I should be getting a qualified electrician but we've been stung so many times and the budget is gone. I think this is easy enough with some advice. I think )

 

[holmslaw]

..

 

[rebuke]

The work you describe is notifiable under Part P of the building regulations to your LABC before doing the work. If you haven't done this yet, it's probably a bit late to get it all done and notified before the weekend...

Note that the 12V downlights as you describe, are actually Extra Low Voltage (ELV), not low voltage. Mains (230V) is low voltage. Also, any electrical equipment in a bathroom now must be RCD protected - it sounds like everything you're putting in is going to be powered off your lighting circuit, is this RCD protected (if not, you will need to add an RCD somewhere)?

You mention out of zone 0 at 2.7m high - zone 0 is the inside of the bath/shower, what you actually mean I assume is out of zone 1/2 (zone 1 being the area directly above the shower/bath, zone 2 being the area around it to a specific distance (can't remember what it is off the top of my head)). Linking the junction boxes together sounds fine.

As for shaver point, I can't picture what your describing clearly, but note that all cables buried at less than 50mm in a wall, must be in safe zones (horizontally and vertically in line with accessories, and a few other areas), so from what you describe i think you'd be better off dropping a new cable down vertically.

If I understand you correctly, you want to turn your existing single lightswitch into a double, with the new switch controlling the mirror lights. This is doable, you'd have to drop a new cable to the switch back box, and then probably put in a junction box, you can't just run the cable from the switch to the lights, since you probably don't have a neutral at your switch (note just because a wire is black does not mean it's a neutral)...