What weight of cable?

[The Agrarian]

I've got a digger in to run some services to a small shed. It will only have lights, kettle, oven and other minor devices. No motors etc. The run is about 25 metres from the switch board.

What weight of armoured cable should I lay down?

Thanks

 

[upnortheast]

Calculators on the web to get your answer.
https://www.clevelandcable.com/calculator.php + lots more to compare results

Maybe worth putting it in a duct incase you need to upgrade at some point

 

[bobk]

6mm swa , but put 12mm in to cover yourself

 

[The Agrarian]

Thanks guys

 

[defender]

Same work putting in a future proof cable as one that will just do for now
Being sensible I would say 16 mm

 

[The Agrarian]

16?

 

[bobk]

16?

We had 80 m for a house , and had to put 35mm swa in ..... try getting that in a consumer unit .

 

[defender]

For a short run of 25 metres there will be less than £50 difference between 16mm and 10 mm
What would be the cost of digging in another cable if that one needs to carry more load in the future

 

[milkloss]

We had 80 m for a house , and had to put 35mm swa in ..... try getting that in a consumer unit .

run it to an isolator near the unit and size down.

 

[Steevo]

We had 80 m for a house , and had to put 35mm swa in ..... try getting that in a consumer unit .

I’ve got a 50mm 1ph on the farm running from main supply meter to a distributor box. Not easy stuff to work with at all.

 

[Steevo]

As above, always go biggest you can afford. The cable is the cheap part.

I usually ask my electrician what he recommends and then use the next size up.

 

[Damomc]

We put 90 mm 4 core down to the farm a few years ago! Jesus that stuff was heavy. Needless to say we can now run anything we like.

 

[wdah/him]

curisoty, what price in some of them, 16mm here is about £5.25 metre, apparently that is big enough to run to our house 100 metres away, it has been for the last 30 odd years but now changing the route and putting it in pipes not just buried.

 

[Pond digger]

I find it intriguing that the electricity companies use none armoured cable with aluminium conductors for 11kva

 

[br jones]

Put s duct in ,or 2 ,then you can do what you like

 

[Lincsman]

I find it intriguing that the electricity companies use none armoured cable with aluminium conductors for 11kva

Sort of makes sense, aluminium carries more power and wire amour want stop a digger so why bother, and its scrap value is less.

 

[defender]

I find it intriguing that the electricity companies use none armoured cable with aluminium conductors for 11kva

a lot of power companies wire is aluminium and has a copper outer wire stranded round like an armour
I was told the reason for this is so that it can't be tapped with a screwnail to steal power
This might just be after the transformer and not high voltage

 

[Exfarmer]

A

Sort of makes sense, aluminium carries more power and wire amour want stop a digger so why bother, and its scrap value is less.

Actually copper carries more power. For some reason UK regulations do not allow anything but copper to be used for domestic and industrial installs. Only the DNOs and above are allowed to use alluminium.
Alluminium is allowed in other systems such as renewables