Tidy up outside electrics

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Steve

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Recently the pond pump went kaput. So we bought a new one. In the mean time, the wire has been trailing across the decking to the JB on the house wall:


Today I removed the pump cable from this box, and wired it into the UV filter by adding a new gland to it (gland bottom left, pump cable black). I also replaced the terminal block in the unit with a larger one, since I couldn't get both flexes into the old one.


The IP rated box now had a big hole in it, so I replaced it.





Top flex to switch
bottom left to pond
bottom middle to mains
bottom right to lights

It looks a lot neater, I'm sure you'll agree.
Someone will notice there is one less flex in the box than before. There are two floodlights. Both wires ran the same way, so I jointed them at the point of separation:





Clearly there was some slack on one cable, I kept this and coiled it up because that fixture may be moved soon.

Overall view:



By the way, the loads are:

UV: 15w
pump: 55w
lighting: 450w

Its all on an FCU with a 5A fuse installed indoors.
 
Nice work.

I went to the local garden centre last weekend, looking for a submersible pump and an external filter / UV box. I asked the guy on the counter in the shop if I needed an IP rated junction box which they also sold, or if the pump/filter package come with one (They were 2 seperate items sold together in one box and I knew both would need an electrical connection but I only had one cable from the garage to the pond for the old combined pump/filter). The reply was "Well that's the legal way to do it, but most people just join the wires in a plastic bag and bury it"!

I bought the junction box.
 
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mikeyd said:
"Well that's the legal way to do it, but most people just join the wires in a plastic bag and bury it"!
Click to expand...

We should conduct a survey of "most people" with ponds, and see how many "join wires in a plastic bag and bury it" blithering idiot he was. He shouldn't even be hinting at such bad practise, especially to naive DIYers (not that you're one of these, but he wasn't to know you werent!)
 
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