Rings or Radials

[Paul505]

Haven't been in the domestic side of things for a while....
I own a standard 3 bed house which is 30 yrs old

1x 50 amp cooker
1x 30amp RFC (for entire house)
1x 15amp immersion heater
1x 5amp upstairs lights
1x 5amp downstairs lights

Going to add and move sockets in kitchen....
In the past i would have created an RFC for the kitchen and kept the rest of house on the existing ring.
After reading a few threads im not sure what the norm is nowadays?
Also im aware of rcd protection, adequate earthing arrangements, notification etc etc
With all the talk about Radials these days im thinking of maybe doing this...

Proposed new circuits...
1x 20amp 2.5mm for the washing machine 2.3kw
1x 20amp 2.5mm for the dishwasher 2.2kw
1x 20amp 2.5mm for the fridge freezer ( for nuisance tripping reasons )
Then the rest of sockets in the kitchen (microwave, toaster, kettle etc) on the existing ring with the rest of the house...

Am i right in saying that any load over 2kw that is on longer than normal is recommended to be on its own dedicated circuit anyway, like immersion heaters for example ?
Im not a fan of 32amp 4.0mm radials supplying multiple skts, but i quite like the idea of 20amp 2.5mm radials dedicated circuits feeding appliances in kitchens drawing a given load for longer than normal, and the rest of sockets on Ring Final Circuits...


Any Replies would be appreciated ...

 

[Engineer54]

Depends on how many spare ways you have in your CU!! ...Or if your replacing the CU, how big you want this new unit to be? Totally up to you, on what method of wiring, you want to distribute your power circuits around your house . I'd personally split the overall FRC into two rings as a minimum. By the way, you must have one hell of a cooking load to justify a 50A breaker!! lol!!!

 

[Octopus]

As you have lights up and lights down, I would suggest sockets up and sockets down and arrange the cu accordingly....

 

[Paul505]

Depends on how many spare ways you have in your CU!! ...Or if your replacing the CU, how big you want this new unit to be? Totally up to you, on what method of wiring, you want to distribute your power circuits around your house . I'd personally split the overall FRC into two rings as a minimum. By the way, you must have one hell of a cooking load to justify a 50A breaker!! lol!!!

The CU was installed when it was built with the old Dorman Smith circuit breakers fitted (ex council property) and the 50amp cooker circuit only has a 2.2kw single fan assisted oven attached, which is plugged into a single skt where the cooker outlet once was, so at least someone has thought about how to fuse it down.
Just had a thought id better have a look at the size of the cable thats attached to the skt behind the oven... could be a right mess!!
I have only lived here a few months.
Yes i will be replacing the consumer unit and i may go down the RCBO route....

 

[Adam W]

I'd probably have the upstairs lights on the same RCD as the downstairs ring, and vice versa. Separate ring for the kitchen with appliances on switched fused spurs.
Fridge freezer on it's own circuit to reduce nuisance tripping.

 

[Andy78]

I'd probably have the upstairs lights on the same RCD as the downstairs ring, and vice versa. Separate ring for the kitchen with appliances on switched fused spurs.
Fridge freezer on it's own circuit to reduce nuisance tripping.

This arrangement gets my vote also. Go the RCBO route if you can afford it.
Obviously if you are going radial crazy in the kitchen then RCBOs are gonna mount the cost up quite a bit.

 

[Brightspark2]

^^^^

What the above 2 people said...

 

[Paul505]

Just want to say thanks for the replies.
The only problem is the existing 1x FRC for the entire house is wired in such a way, where it goes downstairs to a skt then back upstairs to another skt and then downtairs again......etc
So even though i agree it would be good to split the house into at least 2x FRC, to create 1x upstairs and 1x downstairs ring, its basically rip out and start again with how its wired now, unless you use lots of joint boxes....which is definitely not the best thing to do!
In my original post i said..... " i would have in the past created a kitchen FRC and left the rest of the house on the existing FRC " but didnt give the full reasons why.
This i know can easily be done without to much disturbance to the existing FRC.
Also looking back at the replies... FRC still seem to be prefered to Radial Circuits which i thought was the " New thing to do "

 

[Paul505]

I'd probably have the upstairs lights on the same RCD as the downstairs ring, and vice versa. Separate ring for the kitchen with appliances on switched fused spurs.
Fridge freezer on it's own circuit to reduce nuisance tripping.

I would plug appliances into single skts below the worktop, controlled by 20amp double pole switches above the worktop off the FRC, so that the appliance can easily be removed.

 

[telectrix]

you couls also look at splitting the RFC into 2. 1 for 1 side of the house, up and down, and 1 for the other side. i.e sort of 2 vertical RFCs. this would give the advantage of a fault on 1 RFC would still leave sockets up and down.

 

[ezzzekiel]

Nightmare for fault finding though

 

[ringer]

Are you sure all your downstairs sockets are on the ring? If your house was built in the 70s/80s/90s it may be a ring upstairs and spurs dropped for downstairs sockets.

 

[Ponty Massive]

Are you sure all your downstairs sockets are on the ring? If your house was built in the 70s/80s/90s it may be a ring upstairs and spurs dropped for downstairs sockets.

This is exactly how my house has been wired. Built circa 1975. I'll be needing to change my board soon, only has 4 ccts so will be going the RCBO route. Need to do a bit of testing first to see what circuit is where etc, then work out loads to split the ring.

 

[Paul505]

Are you sure all your downstairs sockets are on the ring? If your house was built in the 70s/80s/90s it may be a ring upstairs and spurs dropped for downstairs sockets.

Yes its all on 1x ring circuit with 1 or 2 spurs off ring which you can see have been installed by DIYers in the past.
What you have said about spurs dropped for skts i have seen years ago.
The house i live in was built approx 1980 which is a terraced 3 bed and was a council built property.

 

[Paul505]

Nightmare for fault finding though

Good idea....but i agree, plus it can be confusing on what skt is on what RFC if someone else was to look at it.