Electric cooker switches

Martin Hutson:

I believe you now need a dedicated supply for a new cooker installation with its own circuit breaker at the fuse box. There’s also a switch in the kitchen to isolate it when removing or fitting a new cooker. I don’t know why a quick safe dedicated 32amp appliance  connector  wasn’t developed to stop people botching up this. I was horrified to see the original state of the cabling when my kitchen was replaced.

Any appliance that consumes more than 13A cannot be powered from a ring main, and has to have its own dedicated supply. Ideally any fixed appliance consuming more than 10A should have its own dedicated supply. The modern practice is for houses to have a kitchen ring main separate from the downstairs ring main which somewhat reduces the requirement to have dedicated supplies for higher current appliances.


An older neighbour replaced a full sized electric cooker when her kitchen was refurbished with a two element hob and small oven combo. It plugged into the socket on the cooker switch although this decision was probably more one of convenience of location rather than for technical reasons. Therefore I can't help wondering if that is actually the real reason for the socket. 

Martin Hutson:

I believe you now need a dedicated supply for a new cooker installation with its own circuit breaker at the fuse box. There’s also a switch in the kitchen to isolate it when removing or fitting a new cooker. I don’t know why a quick safe dedicated 32amp appliance  connector  wasn’t developed to stop people botching up this. I was horrified to see the original state of the cabling when my kitchen was replaced.

Any appliance that consumes more than 13A cannot be powered from a ring main, and has to have its own dedicated supply. Ideally any fixed appliance consuming more than 10A should have its own dedicated supply. The modern practice is for houses to have a kitchen ring main separate from the downstairs ring main which somewhat reduces the requirement to have dedicated supplies for higher current appliances.


An older neighbour replaced a full sized electric cooker when her kitchen was refurbished with a two element hob and small oven combo. It plugged into the socket on the cooker switch although this decision was probably more one of convenience of location rather than for technical reasons. Therefore I can't help wondering if that is actually the real reason for the socket.