How to handle safe zone appropriately

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23 Jan 2023
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I'm mounting a heavy item and need to install a few anchor bolts in my garage wall (plaster over breezeblock) 2016 new build in England. And I need to do it in a specific location - and of course, that's 12cm from a wall corner, so within a safe zone. Albeit, given the location and the fact it is on a ground floor on an external wall, it would be an odd place to have a wire...but still :) It is just to the left of the door in the picture (door leads outside) there was a wire run for a security camera previously, which you can see. That wire location it is outside of the safe zone, so all okay there.

What is the appropriate way to go about this (assuming the location is fixed) - cut out a section of plasterboard, starting outside the safe zone, to get a view to where I'll be working and see if I'm in the clear? Hire an electrician (not sure what they would do)? Hire someone else? Not sure if the various 'wire finders' are worthwhile tools or not...

Thanks for the help!
 

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Just take a pragmatic view of that theres not likely to be anything there (floor is concrete right, so unlikely to be anything dropping into floor, look outside for any outside lights, IP sockets, connection boxes, BT/cable termination points. gas meter cabinets, etc) That socket is very likely to go straight up, a very cautious person might turn the power off and pull it forward and make sure that the cables don't come from the right (dropping down in corner and then across would be allowed, but a strange thing to do unless there was a reason). Running one of the metal detctors over it would be a sensible thing to do, but they can be a bit hit and miss.

When drilling and you are not 100% go slowly/in very small bursts. You can usually tell when you are up aainst something you shouldn't if you take your time, of course with modern tools, if you fly in there and lean on the drill, you would be through metal capping very quickly, but take care and when you have popped through the plasterboard, if there is a void behind, you might know that what you have now pressed into isn't wall.

If you are very worried, after marking the hole, you might chip through the plasterboard on the surface with an old screwdriver and a hammer and then look/prod behind, no need to take a big section out, just go through plasterboard by hand, check then continue with drill.

In the end, there is no 100% rule, just be as careful as you can and if you do hit something after that, then it just needs to be dealt with and you have done everything reasonable
 

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