3 bed re-wire - how to 'attack it'

[electek]

Hi All ,
Going to be starting a 3-bed rewire on an occupied property that is to be used as my 'part p' assessment. The house is owned by family but is occupied with furniture and carpets in place and will be lived in throughout the rewire !

The downstairs floor is concrete so all wiring for downstairs sockets will have to come vertically down the walls from upstairs.

My question is , what is the best way to attempt it .i.e i need to leave power on each night. What would you do first for example would you lay all cables first and swap over CU last ?

Has anyone got a general procedure that they follow to minimise disturbance ?

I don't really have any electrical issues its just knowing how to go about it !!

Any help appreciated.

Regards

Chris.

 

[m4tty]

Get them to move out lol

 

[eddielarge]

If its occupied and you have to wire all the power through the upstais joists, one one i have done it in the past is to wire 1 half of the house one one ring (ie bedroom 2&3 and front room on one) then when thats done transfer all the stuff across,

 

[baldsparkies]

Dont go mad on lifting floor boards (You can work wonders with the lid from MT 2 Try to get as much 1st fix in as possible, are you surface or chasing in. Run circuits and leave something old for temps until you change cu and energise the new stuff. Make sure you educate the customer with regards to distruption whats being done ect. Finally dont sell yourself short on price cus its hard graft with the buggers still living there, as for the furniture, look after your back, good luck.

By the way. You just reminded me why I love commercial and maintenance work.

 

[electek]

Thanks for the comments
Anyone else any advice ?

Thanks
Chris.

 

[chris gray]

dont do it by yourself

 

[pennywise]

Do it from the loft down.

Bonding
upstairs lights.
upstairs sockets & downstairs lights at the same time.
downstairs sockets/kitchen.
consumer unit

 

[Spudnik]

The aggro you are going to experience with this will be HUGE!

I hope you allowed at least double your labour as it will take nearly twice as long than if it was empty.

Good luck!

 

[Retroviper]

Pray that there are no solid noggins under there or you end up having to cut traps under that double wardrobe or in the middle of the room where you have just moved all the other stuff to!!!
I also agree that MT 2 and MT 1 lid is fantastic .

 

[Phil]

once did a 5 bed occupied with junk everywhere, place was a nightmare one of the first rewires i did but hell of a learning curve. down to the crispy tissues under teenagers beds and moldy food. yak nearly crawled out every night.

 

[kung]

Id start with getting lights out the way first ! by the way do yourself a favour and knock up a link CU ! get some wood (fire prof) and connect a CU to it then wire in a couple of sockets to it then connect the meter tails to that then your free to connect whatever circuits you want and run an ext to fridge/freezer/kettle/fish tank etc !

 

[Stokey]

Well there are two ways of doing it, room by room, but allow more time to do it this way, empty the room lift carpets rewire all cables back to the landing and leave long to reach the next points in the next room etc, do a bedroom and the room below at the same time, then once rewired, boxed chased and plastered, take all the crap out of the next room and put it in the rewired rooms. Clients like this method because the whole house is not disrupted in one go. but this takes more time and costs more money.

If you do decide to rewire complete circuits, my advice would be to get all the earth conductors through first as pulling 10mm through with twin will increase the risk of burning the twins, then get all the big twins in, showers, cookers, immersions and rings, then the ground floor lights and loft light feed, as it is much easier to run 1.0mm through the existing joists holes if they are getting full than say trying to pull a 6mm through the holes, leave the upstairs lights till last because you roughly know how long they will take to clip and wire and it is the filthiest job, 2 - 3 hours usually wires and second fixes the upstairs lights if its terraced. Mains change and testing on the last day.

Use junction boxes on the existing circuits or at the mains to keep the power, cooker and lighting on at night and weekends.

As others have said it is hard work, sh*t work & demoralising, but I love the challenge.

P.s don't try to do it yourself, lived in rewires are at least a 2 man job.

Good luck I hope it goes well.

 

[telepath]

I did a 'lived in' rewire with another electrician and we ran all the circuits placing the socket outlets next to the existing outlets until the cu needed changing then switched over to the new circuits. Finally removing the original circuits.

Lighting circuits can be rewired and pulled through the ceiling if the roses are detached.

This allows the supply to remain on until the new installation is energised. As has been said it takes a little while longer, but there is less disruption to the supply.