A complete house rewire where to start????

[Pete999]

I don't think its beyond the OP's scope to do this work, although perhaps he could qualify his qualifications, and perhaps cite them in his profile page.

Would appear your are doing this rewire in your own property, whilst yourself & family are living in the place?

What other works besides the rewire would take place, before, during & after the rewire?

Good advice from others. You have to doing the work, whilst still leaving it habital. As suggested some thinking, before starting work will be required to facilitate living in the place. Consider where your cable runs in voids will be, can they be done in a different place to existing. Planning the amount of cables that are likely to be in those runs, you'll only have so many joist to drill holes in.

You could consider running radial/RFC circuits and placement of outlets, and leave existing working until a particular point. I would be running my new final circuits as many as possible, but not energising. What thats done, only install and swop over your CU's. If the kitchen is being refurbished, run the cables to a particular point, then do the kitchen refurb, after that. Another thing I seen done is sockets done for one side of the property etc, as opposed each level or floor, so you still have existing sockets available.

Good luck.

Agree with the first Pargraph

 

[Baddegg]

Starting points for me....mark up walls and ceilings then check joist directions and plan cable routes, and make sure your new consumer unit fits where you want it to..
Then prepare for a lot of mess and disruption, as you say you are living there during works so you have more time to plan and do the works,kitchen will be the most amount of disruption especially if you aren’t renewing it at the same time.
I’ve done one before in my own property and managed to leave most of the existing installation in situ untill it came to swooping out the CU.
You’ll be fine just plan and take your time

 

[Pete999]

Starting points for me....mark up walls and ceilings then check joist directions and plan cable routes, and make sure your new consumer unit fits where you want it to..
Then prepare for a lot of mess and disruption, as you say you are living there during works so you have more time to plan and do the works,kitchen will be the most amount of disruption especially if you aren’t renewing it at the same time.
I’ve done one before in my own property and managed to leave most of the existing installation in situ untill it came to swooping out the CU.
You’ll be fine just plan and take your time

Sound and sensible ideas in theory, but of course if all goe to plan you could be on a winner, we all know that the best intentions hardly ever work, in my experience if you chase everything before any wiring is done, what would happen if when it come to actually doing any wiring you find that it's impossible to get the new cables where your chases are? get the cables in situ prior to any chasing.
Rewires done using obviously skill, but more importantly thinking on the hoof, you will never be able
plan your cable route 100% you have to change routing as you go most of the time, depending on how the House joist are laid out, yes I agree check the way the joist are running, but like most things it doesn't always turn out the way you think, knowing the theory of the circuitry required is only half of the story, solving routing etc is the rest, your ideas are sound in theory, but having done many rewires, they don't always pan out the way you would expect. Sorry for the ramble.

 

[ruston]

@Pete999 . Like finding an RSJ in a property you would least expect it...

 

[Pete999]

@Pete999 . Like finding an RSJ in a property you would least expect it...

Or they needed to beef up the loading by slapping a piece of joist between two joists at 90 deg thus blocking your carefully planned cable routing, have seen some floors where lou look at the way the joists are running, only to find in the middle of the room they change direction, that's a pain isn't it?

 

[ruston]

Yes , some houses have a character all of their own. Another example is ash as soundproofing.

 

[Baddegg]

Or they needed to beef up the loading by slapping a piece of joist between two joists at 90 deg thus blocking your carefully planned cable routing, have seen some floors where lou look at the way the joists are running, only to find in the middle of the room they change direction, that's a pain isn't it?

I’d expect to find that during the route planning stages?

 

[Baddegg]

Sound and sensible ideas in theory, but of course if all goe to plan you could be on a winner, we all know that the best intentions hardly ever work, in my experience if you chase everything before any wiring is done, what would happen if when it come to actually doing any wiring you find that it's impossible to get the new cables where your chases are? get the cables in situ prior to any chasing.
Rewires done using obviously skill, but more importantly thinking on the hoof, you will never be able
plan your cable route 100% you have to change routing as you go most of the time, depending on how the House joist are laid out, yes I agree check the way the joist are running, but like most things it doesn't always turn out the way you think, knowing the theory of the circuitry required is only half of the story, solving routing etc is the rest, your ideas are sound in theory, but having done many rewires, they don't always pan out the way you would expect. Sorry for the ramble.

Not really theory Pete more tried n tested just trying to give the op some tips, we all have to start somewhere and a little encouragement doesn’t hurt..

 

[Gavin John Hyde]

Spot on @Pete999 I couldnt have described my approach better than how you did it.
I like to plan the cable routes from the new CU and how i will get them to the attic for the light and likewise use same holes wherever possible to route other circuits.
I also like to where possible have the new CU on the wall ready to connect each part up as it is done and then remove the old circuits as you go. this is my preferred approach if its lived in,

 

[Pete999]

Not really theory Pete more tried n tested just trying to give the op some tips, we all have to start somewhere and a little encouragement doesn’t hurt..

Not meant to be having a dig Mate, sorry if you took it that way, just my experience tells me it 's not always as cut and dried as you propose, but yes you're right we all need to start somewhere, guess it is a disagreement between 2 Sparkies, always good to have a debate.

 

[Pete999]

Spot on @Pete999 I couldnt have described my approach better than how you did it.
I like to plan the cable routes from the new CU and how i will get them to the attic for the light and likewise use same holes wherever possible to route other circuits.
I also like to where possible have the new CU on the wall ready to connect each part up as it is done and then remove the old circuits as you go. this is my preferred approach if its lived in,

Some of the places I have rewired leave tell tell evidence of cable routing, by spotting the floor boards that have been lifted a few times, at least that's my experience.

 

[ruston]

Lol , never put a screw in an empty used nail hole on a squeaky board either..

 

[Baddegg]

no probs Pete honestly, I don’t doubt you’ve wired and rewired more houses than I’m ever likely to! But I do agree that all the planning in world won’t cover every eventuality, the work arounds is what comes with experience and understanding how a building works can only be learned by coming up against this stuff.

OP,everyone has they own way of approaching this and every rewire is different, rewiring your own house (assuming you are competent) is a great way to learn this stuff without to much pressure.

 

[ruston]

[QUOTE="

OP,everyone has they own way of approaching this and every rewire is different, rewiring your own house (assuming you are competent) is a great way to learn this stuff without to much pressure.[/QUOTE]

Only if you are single.

 

[telectrix]

send wife and kids on a 2 week holiday. this gives you 3 distinct advantages.

1. you can rewire without putting everything back.
2 you can go without a bath for a fortnight
3. no nagging (wife) and none of this "want it now" crap from the saucepans.

winner.