Morgaine Dinova:

If someone could post links to online standards and advice for wiring up domestic consumer units both large and small, that would make very interesting reading.  It's somewhat embarrassing to be well acquainted with many advanced areas of E&EE yet lack basic knowledge of what is standard practice for every electrical installer. :-)


Morgaine.

The 17th edition Wiring Regulations contains useful information as all new installations (should) comply with it but implementing them in practice often requires knowledge and experience of an electrical installer. Split load consumer units are new beasts as they are not directly drop-in replacements for old school fuse boxes like single load consumer units are. An installer will have to answer the question about which circuit should be connected to which particular bank of MCBs under the control of an RCD, and which circuit would be best provided with its own RCBO, to ensure that the consumer unit is wired up optimally. Modern consumer units accomodate a number of control and switching devices - such as time switches, contactors, kWh meters etc. - as well as MCBs so these also have to be taken into account.


University engineering departments aren't generally very good when it comes to teaching undergrads about the basics of building electrical systems. I suspect that very few lecturers know much about the subject as they do not come from an electrical installation background.

Morgaine Dinova:

If someone could post links to online standards and advice for wiring up domestic consumer units both large and small, that would make very interesting reading.  It's somewhat embarrassing to be well acquainted with many advanced areas of E&EE yet lack basic knowledge of what is standard practice for every electrical installer. :-)


Morgaine.

The 17th edition Wiring Regulations contains useful information as all new installations (should) comply with it but implementing them in practice often requires knowledge and experience of an electrical installer. Split load consumer units are new beasts as they are not directly drop-in replacements for old school fuse boxes like single load consumer units are. An installer will have to answer the question about which circuit should be connected to which particular bank of MCBs under the control of an RCD, and which circuit would be best provided with its own RCBO, to ensure that the consumer unit is wired up optimally. Modern consumer units accomodate a number of control and switching devices - such as time switches, contactors, kWh meters etc. - as well as MCBs so these also have to be taken into account.


University engineering departments aren't generally very good when it comes to teaching undergrads about the basics of building electrical systems. I suspect that very few lecturers know much about the subject as they do not come from an electrical installation background.