Thread: A question for sparkies.

Yes, my present conduits are orange for power and grey for phone. I doubt I can use the orange conduit for new wiring as it has a few sharp right angle bends - not the large radius bends one would expect. I'm not sure that we could pull new wire through it. The existing power conduit is also very close to the surface (less than 200mm) near the garage as I found this week whilst digging a trench for drainage - another reason I want to run new ones.

600mm trench depth as mentioned by Bee Utey sounds familiar. I think I need to go an hire a machine. I just don't want to hit the sewer which runs across the yard and under the garage (There are two sewer access points in the garage floor).

I suppose I now need a licenced cabler for the phone, etc. Mine was done when I was a Principal Technical Officer in the telecomms business and one didn't need an Austel licence.

Originally Posted by rovercare

Why for? Row's and slots like a PLC if you wish, i.e. Row 1, Slot 1- 1/1

But whats wrong with littles stickers stipulating whats what and your only gonna reset whats tripped anyhow

It's more an issue of knowing what needs to be operated to isolate a circuit.

Years ago, I was in charge of a maintenance workshop in OTC Head Office. The electrician in Head Office was one of my blokes but he was a bugger for NOT maintaining wiring records. His method of finding live circuits before I took over the section was to just cut the cables with his pliers (Crescent brand). Live circuits blew the cutting jaws away. He soon stopped that when I refused to replace his pliers. He still wouldn't maintain wiring records, though.

At least my electricians when I managed the OTC Paddington and Broadway international telecomms buildings did do their job properly.

Originally Posted by p38arover

I looked in my copy of AS/NZS 3000:2000 but must have missed that section.

Back to reading it again.

Different standard no. AS1103 Item Designations. May have been replaced by an IEC no.
You won't find that info in AS3000 Wiring Rules.
Wouldn't worry about it. CB1 is just fine.

A little hint, Install the cables as you lay the conduit. Its much aesier than pulling the cable after.

Originally Posted by Mick_Marsh

A little hint, Install the cables as you lay the conduit. Its much aesier than pulling the cable after.

seconded and that also lets you get the cable through some seriously bent up routes. just go one section of the conduit at a time, a bit time consuming but less consuming than if the cable jambs and you snap the pull through.

power needs to be 600 deep in H/D conduit, you need to install underground power line marking tape at 300 deep on top of the power conduit. Comms stuff in comms conduit at 300 is fine.
Your sparky by law has to label the switchboard anyway, but more than likely he will just put power stickers under the power circuits and light stickers under the light circuits. If you were to label it CB1, then you should label all the applicable power points CB1 etc...
i'd run 6mm2 TPS minimum to your shed, good for 32Amp, possibly 40A depending on how its run.
14A is a big split sytem, or an old one

Originally Posted by Mick_Marsh

Different standard no. AS1103 Item Designations. May have been replaced by an IEC no.
You won't find that info in AS3000 Wiring Rules.
Wouldn't worry about it. CB1 is just fine.

A little hint, Install the cables as you lay the conduit. Its much easier than pulling the cable after.

Ahh. I don't have AS1103. I may have to go back to where I used to work to download it.

I have a spring steel coiled pull through. I want to have as much prep work done for him as possible (whoever it ends up being).

Originally Posted by Vern

power needs to be 600 deep in H/D conduit, you need to install underground power line marking tape at 300 deep on top of the power conduit. Comms stuff in comms conduit at 300 is fine.
Your sparky by law has to label the switchboard anyway, but more than likely he will just put power stickers under the power circuits and light stickers under the light circuits. If you were to label it CB1, then you should label all the applicable power points CB1 etc...
i'd run 6mm2 TPS minimum to your shed, good for 32Amp, possibly 40A depending on how its run.
14A is a big split sytem, or an old one

Whoever wired the garage up before we bought the house didn't bury it very deeply and didn't put tape above it.

The labelling on the board is what I did a few days ago. It's temporary until the job is done then they will be replaced with computer generated and printed labels. The original labels done by the sparky were just as you stated.

The aircon is the old WeatherWall that I removed from the front of the house a couple of months ago (it was replaced by a ducted system). I either install it or find a way to get rid of it.

I'll open up the junction block to see what wire is currently used for the feed-in. I suspect smaller, possibly 4mm2, because of the pulsing lights when my 13CFM air compressor is running.

I have just connected the shed up to power.

I ran all of the cables internally myself, and also a 6mmTPS to the main box. This is 800 - 900 underground in orange hd conduit, 300 cover, then cat 5 & alarm cables in another conduit, another 300 cover, warning tape, 200 cover and then more tape just under the surface. This is mainly so that I know where it is when I start to run the irrigation pipes, and know if I hit the first tape, I still have a bit of distance before hitting the next one.

All the internals in the shed were run inside conduit, and each GPO is numbered, and on its own circuit.

I've measured the cables to the garage.

From the main switchboard at the front of the house to the rear (about 18 metres) where there is an external GPO, the cable is 2mm dia solid wire in TPS. That computes to 3.14 sq mm.

From this GPO to the garage (about 12 metres of cable to the distribution board, it's 7/0.9mm building wire. That computes to 4.45 sq mm. I can't find a listing for that size wire, just 7/1.04 which is 5.94 sq mm.

Late edit: I just found the General Cable catalogue on line. The cable to the garage is probably 7/0.85 or 4 sq mm. which is, in my opinion, too small although General rate 4 sq mm at 30A in conduit in air. They rate 4 sq mm TPS at 40A buried in a duct buy I don't know if building wire is higher rated in a buried conduit.