"Pretty" or "Smart" consumer unit options.

[DefyG]

I missed this post on the first pass. What make/model is that ?

Proteus 12way at Cities

 

[nicebutdim]

@Joules that is exactly what I will do when I get home. You are new to the forum so I will let your attitude pass.

314.1 (iv)
314.2
531.3.2

Given the continuing uptake in appliances designed to intentionally leak current to earth, I struggle to understand how anyone could argue in favour of installing boards with individual RCDs protecting multiple circuits (in all but a limited circumstances) as this presumes knowledge of a homeowner's future intentions.

 

[Joules]

314.1 (iv)
314.2
531.3.2

Given the continuing uptake in appliances designed to intentionally leak current to earth, I struggle to understand how anyone could argue in favour of installing boards with individual RCDs protecting multiple circuits (in all but a limited circumstances) as this presumes knowledge of a homeowner's future intentions.

In Quality Assurance terms what does BS7671 represent? The answer is the promotion and application of Good Practice or GxP. An intended install is subject to the processes of verification and validation.

Verification is a process that ensures that the components of an install are those set out by the designer in a design. The process does not necessarily ensure that the design meets the original requirement.

The process of Validation is to ensure that the design does meet the original requirement and, in this respect, both parts of 531.3.2 (i) (ii) can fail this test because of established practice. This is because the requirement says that a protective device must disconnect the electrical supply in a timely manner to prevent electric shock.

The established practice for 531.3.2(i) is to install a board filled entirely with Type A RCBO. The difficulty at present is that non-contact instruments that can detect and measure the presence of a continuous dc current in a circuit load do not exist. Should such a dc current be present then it would desensitize the magnetic sensor present in an RCBO/RCD to the point that it may fail to operate as required.

The only way to safely implement 531.3.2 (i) (ii) is to fit Type B RCBO/RCD.

This is why in the original post it says that this is very expensive with typical retail prices of Type B RCBO around £150 each. The install cost falls for 531.3.2(ii) because fewer Type B RCD/RCBO are required. These split levels boards can only be installed if the circuit loads are profiled such that at any given time, a mA leakage test would return the same value within the allowable range something that does not occur with ring main loads. As a consequence, ring main circuits must be protected separately by Type B RCBO in order to be validation compliant.

 

[Shanep92]

Disclaimer: Not a pro sparky, so i have no intention of doing this myself, but I am looking for options that I can then take to someone qualified.

I am looking to replace the consumer unit in our house for a number of reasons, and its location means that it is directly visible by anyone coming into the house. As such I would like something thats a little more cosmetically pleasing than the normal consumer unit. If it can intergrate smart features too, that would be a bonus.

It needs to be at least a 12 way unit. A neat flush mounting unit might work, but that will require some alerations to the construction, so a good looking surface mount unit would be better.
Ideally it would be vertically orientated as the space the current unit is in is quite slim ( ~320mm) but quite tall (~650mm) with a bit of wiggle room.

I was spurred to look for better options after seeing a video about the US smart panel made by span: SPAN® Home | Electrify your life - https://www.span.io/ however after spending a couple of hours looking there doesnt appear to be anything even slightly similar in the UK, and definitely not with any smart features.

The best I can find is the regular, but smart looking, Schneider Easy 9 Plus, but thats a bit big for my available space unless it was mounted at 90 degrees. The Easy 9 Multi-Row might work, but doesnt look as good.

So my questions are two fold:

Firstly, does anyone have any suggestions of any options that are out there that look better than a regular wylex or whatever, and/or have any smart features? (power monitoring, remote control, etc).

Secondly, does anyone know if there is any reason a regular consumer unit cant be mounted at 90 degrees? (Its not like the electrons are going to spill out)

Thanks.

I’ve been partial to using fusebox stuff recently, good tackle for the price and in my opinion it looks good and the inside is well thought out, they also don’t seem to distort when they get busy like some do.