Adding a second socket to a room off of another socket.. Is it really this 'easy'?

[reoreborn]

Hi there.
We recently moved into a house which needs a bit of working doing to it. While my wife and I have been able to do most of it ourselves (changing taps, fitting a new bath, refitting double plugs, changing lights etc) there's a few things we're not 100% sure on when it comes to electrics l. one of which is adding a second double socket to a corner of the room that only has one plug in.
We got a few quotes in and they were quite a bit more than we were expecting £210-£250. As we're trying to keep costs low and learn new skills ourselves we decided to Have a quick Google. there's quite a lot of videos and ppl saying it's a very simple job if you've ever replaced a wall socket. (Which we have) Most videos show doing it like this.

.
Is it really as simple as the video shows?

Additional info: All sockets and electrics in the house have been tested and all are working safe and well. I'm not interested in channeling the wire to the new socket and it'll be in a conduit.

Thanks for any help you can give.

 

[ericmark]

Not quite, one I would use oval conduit with existing plaster so not so much plaster needs removing, but he has missed out all the inspection and testing.

So step one, how many cables go to donor socket? He shows two, so likely part of a ring or radial, not a spur. So these plans show what we can do. So my start would be plug some thing in, and see what MCB/RCBO controls it. If a 20 amp we are looking at second diagram, if 32 amp likely the first diagram. We have different ways to feed sockets, as part of a ring final, as part of a radial, as part of a unfused spur, and as part of a fused spur. Also looking to see if RCD protected.

So looking at worse case, one will need to replace the double socket box with a twin socket box, one of these will allow you to have a fused connection unit (FCU) and a single socket, then feed as many sockets as you want from that FCU clearly total draw is 13 amp, but you are safe, if not already RCD protected then a RCD FCU will do both for the extra sockets, you can use a grid system and the existing twin back box, but you need to know how to wire it up.

If it is a ring final, then you can extend the ring final (two cables) or take an unfused spur, but step one is to test if actually a ring final, and not some previous non compliant work. So you need some form of tester, it could be a battery powered door bell, hence the phrase bell it out.

So I am going to jump, one of these cost around £700, you can often hire them, around £70, but I would not expect most DIY people to have one of these, however at £43 theseseem to be a reasonable test, they do not test to 1.38Ω which is pass point for a ring, but are good enough for most DIY jobs, but where does one stop? One of these can test earth leakage, as can one of these both cost £35 we are now getting closer to what the full test set does, but getting to the point of can the DIY man use them. As an electrician I returned to collage on a 12 week course at 3 hours a week to get my inspection and testing qualification C&G 2391, I can hardly tell you all I have learnt on a forum.

So the big question is what is enough? I am not saying you can't do the job, I am sure you can, however the video shows a resent install being modified, people rarely post pictures of poor work, so I think at this point I will stop, and let others say what they think, that's how forums work, we bounce ideas off each other.

 

[trojanhawrs]

The first thing to do if you don't already have one is to get a cheap multimeter to identify if you're on the ring. Find the feed to the socket you want to come off and switch off the breaker (if it's 32A it's probably a ring). Open up the socket, if there's 3 cables in there it's already feeding a spur and I'd suggest getting an electrician. If there's 2 double check you've got no voltage (V~) with your meter between live-earth and live-neutral, disconnect them and test between each conductor for continuity. You do this by setting the meter to the noise symbol, touch the leads together and the beep confirms continuity - then test live-live, n-n and earth-earth with them disconnected and not touching. If they all beep this confirms you're on the ring and you can safely feed 1 double socket from it with 2.5mm T+E. If only some or none of them beep, you're not on the ring or the ring is broken and you should get an electrician.

I'm not interested in channeling the wire to the new socket and it'll be in a conduit.

Thanks for any help you can give.

If you don't want to go into the wall you'll have to replace the existing socket box with a surface mount socket box as well. Surface mount boxes like this allow you to connect 20mm conduit adapters. Fixing it over the existing flush box might require some creativity.

 

[Murdochcat]

Out of interest how much were you expecting to pay?

Does your CU have RCD protection?

 

[SUNRAY]

The first thing to do if you don't already have one is to get a cheap multimeter to identify if you're on the ring. Find the feed to the socket you want to come off and switch off the breaker (if it's 32A it's probably a ring). Open up the socket, if there's 3 cables in there it's already feeding a spur and I'd suggest getting an electrician. If there's 2 double check you've got no voltage (V~) with your meter between live-earth and live-neutral, disconnect them and test between each conductor for continuity. You do this by setting the meter to the noise symbol, touch the leads together and the beep confirms continuity - then test live-live, n-n and earth-earth with them disconnected and not touching. If they all beep this confirms you're on the ring and you can safely feed 1 double socket from it with 2.5mm T+E. If only some or none of them beep, you're not on the ring or the ring is broken and you should get an electrician.

Use the lowest resistance setting, usually marked 200Ω and expect to see less than 5Ω. The buzzer may sound with resistance up to 200 or even 2000Ω with some of the cheap meters.

If you don't want to go into the wall you'll have to replace the existing socket box with a surface mount socket box as well. Surface mount boxes like this allow you to connect 20mm conduit adapters. Fixing it over the existing flush box might require some creativity.

I wouldn't normally expect to fit a surface box in this situation, just make a small hole in the plaster beside the socket big enough to dip the cable in and fit a rubber grommet.

 

[trojanhawrs]

I wouldn't normally expect to fit a surface box in this situation, just make a small hole in the plaster beside the socket big enough to dip the cable in and fit a rubber grommet.

You could do that, it'd look like **** with conduit though. Could use an end box I suppose.

 

[Mottie]

Perhaps change your existing two gang outlet for a surface box if you have enough slack on the cables and then trunking to another surface box wouldn’t look too bad?

 

[sparkwright]

That's a hell of a lot damage. Being a dot and dab wall, a lot of the cable could have been fished behind the board, and chased only where a dot is.

Still, not my problem.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

That's a hell of a lot damage. Being a dot and dab wall, a lot of the cable could have been fished behind the board, and chased only where a dot is.

Still, not my problem.

The point of the youtube videos, is the views earn for the poster. Accuracy, or the proper way to tackle a job, does not matter, just the views.

 

[jurassic sparkk]

If you're confident then why not? Good to have a high ego...

 

[ebee]

Why did he replace the 25mm Box with a deeper box?

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Why did he replace the 25mm Box with a deeper box?

Because it got the video more views!

 

[reoreborn]

Not quite, one I would use oval conduit with existing plaster so not so much plaster needs removing, but he has missed out all the inspection and testing.

So step one, how many cables go to donor socket? He shows two, so likely part of a ring or radial, not a spur. So these plans View attachment 341244View attachment 341245 show what we can do. So my start would be plug some thing in, and see what MCB/RCBO View attachment 341246 controls it. If a 20 amp we are looking at second diagram, if 32 amp likely the first diagram. We have different ways to feed sockets, as part of a ring final, as part of a radial, as part of a unfused spur, and as part of a fused spur. Also looking to see if RCD protected.

So looking at worse case, one will need to replace the double socket box with a twin socket box, one of these View attachment 341248will allow you to have a fused connection unit (FCU) and a single socket, then feed as many sockets as you want from that FCU clearly total draw is 13 amp, but you are safe, if not already RCD protected then a RCD FCU will do both for the extra sockets, you can use a grid system and the existing twin back box, but you need to know how to wire it up.

If it is a ring final, then you can extend the ring final (two cables) or take an unfused spur, but step one is to test if actually a ring final, and not some previous non compliant work. So you need some form of tester, it could be a battery powered door bell, hence the phrase bell it out.

So I am going to jump, one of these View attachment 341249cost around £700, you can often hire them, around £70, but I would not expect most DIY people to have one of these, however at £43 theseView attachment 341250seem to be a reasonable test, they do not test to 1.38Ω which is pass point for a ring, but are good enough for most DIY jobs, but where does one stop? One of these View attachment 341251 can test earth leakage, as can one of these View attachment 341252 both cost £35 we are now getting closer to what the full test set does, but getting to the point of can the DIY man use them. As an electrician I returned to collage on a 12 week course at 3 hours a week to get my inspection and testing qualification C&G 2391, I can hardly tell you all I have learnt on a forum.

So the big question is what is enough? I am not saying you can't do the job, I am sure you can, however the video shows a resent install being modified, people rarely post pictures of poor work, so I think at this point I will stop, and let others say what they think, that's how forums work, we bounce ideas off each other.

Thank you to everyone Ody who replied. I've read all your replies and thank you for every one of them.
Also, I'm so sorry for the late reply. Sadly my wife was taken ill (She's fine now thank goodness) with a severe kidney infection.
I'll be totally honest a huge part of your very in-depth reply I couldn't understand (My fault not yours lol) so I think maybe it's a little to advance for me. however, I did take this photo of the socket when it was open (we'd just moved in).

As I say though this sounds a bit advance for me at this stage. Thank you all once again

 

[reoreborn]

Out of interest how much were you expecting to pay?

Does your CU have RCD protection?

I guess about £120. In our old house I paid £60 for the same thing but that was about 5-6 years back.

 

[trojanhawrs]

You need a multimeter, set to continuity and check red-red and black-black. If it beeps you're in business.