I inherited my parents' house and the fuse box was the original one from when it was built. Mike replaced it in a day with a modern board and explained everything in a way that didn't make me feel daft for asking. He found a wiring problem in the kitchen along the way and sorted it the same day. Lovely chap.
Fuse-wire box to fully-RCBO board, Christleton
Mary's 1970s wired-fuse box was original to the house. Replaced in a day with a Hager 18th-edition board, full circuit testing, and Building Control notification.
Mary inherited her parents' house in Christleton last year. The consumer unit was the original 1970s wired-fuse box — bakelite, six 30A wire fuses, no RCD on anything. Anyone working in the loft would have been working without protection.
We swapped it for a Hager Design 30 with individual RCBO protection on every circuit. The advantage with this board is that a fault on (say) the upstairs sockets trips only that circuit, not the whole house. Mary doesn't lose the freezer or the Wi-Fi every time the lawnmower trips.
Power was off from 9am to about 1pm. We tested every circuit before the swap (to spot any issues that would surface during the first energise) and again after. One borrowed-neutral on the kitchen lighting needed sorting before the new board would hold — that's the kind of thing the new RCBOs flag immediately and the old fuses would have ignored for another decade.
Notified to Building Control under Part P. Electrical Installation Certificate issued the same evening.
Materials & specifications
- Consumer unit
- Hager Design 30 VML112CURK 12-way
- Protection
- Individual Type-A RCBOs on every circuit
- Surge
- Hager SPD Type 2 fitted as standard
- Notification
- Part P notified to Cheshire West Building Control
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