The great outdoors

Virtually all wiring accessories manufacturers will tell you that people are making much more use of power outdoors, particularly in the residential sector. For instance, there has been an explosion in the range of garden power tools available through DIY sheds at affordable prices. At the same time, tv ‘makeover’ programmes have encouraged us to make more use of our gardens; sitting on the decking, sipping a gin and tonic under electric lighting and watching the light play across the compulsory pump-powered water feature.

And with all of this we want greater convenience. Apart from the safety hazards of dangling an extension lead through a window, this make do approach is no longer acceptable. We want our power on tap: “It’s the same principle as having an outside tap for a hose,” suggests Paul Martin of Hager. “We used to put the hose through the kitchen window and attach it to the kitchen tap, now we expect to have an outside tap. The same is true of electrical sockets and switches,” he adds.

Until recently many homeowners will have been tempted to install these outdoor products themselves and there are plenty of products that will do the job in the DIY stores. However, this is not necessarily the safest approach. “People do not always appreciate how dangerous electricity can be,” warns Paul Evans of Contactum. “They wouldn’t dream of touching gas, but they take it for granted that they can play around with electricity,” he continues.

To that end, Part P of the Building Regulations makes a special point of including outdoor wiring in the ‘significant’ electrical work that will have to be carried out by a qualified electrician in the future. Phil Hope, the minister at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) responsible for the Building Regulations, commented: “Most small electrical jobs won’t be covered by the Regulations. It won’t apply to repairs to power-points or putting spurs onto a circuit, unless you are working in the kitchen or bathroom area or outdoors, because electricity and water don’t mix”.

Clearly, many homeowners will still be tempted to carry out the work and not tell anyone, but that could backfire on them when they come to sell their property, as any such work will need to be backed by a certificate. “If people ignore [the Part P regulations] they run the risk of getting into huge problems when it comes to selling their house,” notes councillor Barbara Tait of Stroud District Council. “This sort of work cannot be approved retrospectively,” she adds.

This means that there is more scope for competent electricians to take this work away from the DIY sector and provide the necessary certification. “There is definitely an opportunity for the contractor to upsell the value of the contract,” Martin suggests. “And, of course, the contractor may spot things that the end-user hasn’t thought of and can offer to include additional items such as outside sockets in the contract.”

Beyond the residential sector, there are many other opportunities for outdoor accessories. In static caravan parks and marinas, for example, each caravan or boat will generally have a weatherproof consumer unit located outside and, quite often, an outside socket for using power externally. There is also demand for sockets and switches on many building sites, car parks and other amenity areas.

These specialised products do not need to be confined to outdoors – there are many indoor applications requiring high levels of ingress protection. Obvious examples include garages; joinery shops where a lot of dust is created; and anywhere that regular hosing down is required – such as in the food industry.

In terms of choosing products for outdoors, sockets are the most commonly installed items and they seem to come in at two levels. There are the ‘cheap and cheerful’ versions that offer only limited ingress protection and the ‘upmarket’ versions that provide IP56 or IP66 protection even when there is a plug in the socket. With the latter, it is important that the socket is able to accommodate the wide variety of plug shapes that are on the market.

Both IP56 and IP66-rated products offer protection against a strong jet of water – indicated by the second figure 6. The difference between them is in the level of protection against dust ingress, with IP56 offering limited and IP66 offering total protection against dust. For reference, a breakdown of IP ratings is provided in table 1, above.

“Basic sockets are only splashproof when an appliance is plugged in, whereas people should be looking for a model that maintains full ingress protection, even when the socket is in use,” says Ian Stephenson of Legrand Electric. “For example, there is now a much wider use of high pressure hoses in the home for cleaning things such as mountain bikes and garden appliances. These need a power supply to the pump, but there is a clear risk of the socket being hosed as well, so it’s important to ensure that any such risk is eliminated,” he continues.

In some cases, there may also be a benefit to being able to lock the socket so it can’t be interfered with by unauthorised people. “Lockable sockets, which can be locked with the plug inserted, are very popular in a lot of local authority applications, such as schools, where power is needed outside but there is a danger of interference,” observes Evans.

Most outdoor accessories are now moulded in plastics, which has obvious advantages in terms of weatherproofing and the ability to create a more stylish design. Plastics also allow for more functionality. “One of the benefits of plastics is that you can use two different materials in the mould, one to provide the strong casing and a softer material to form the gasket in the top of the socket – so the gasket is part of the socket and can’t be lost or work itself loose,” notes Stephenson.

The type of plastics used for the casing, however, is very important as some plastics will become brittle in cold weather and less able to withstand physical damage. The preferred plastics for these applications are ABS and polycarbonate, which are very resistant to impact as well as the weather.

Sockets will also contain metals and these need to offer the same weather resistance. “It’s important that all the metal parts of the unit are resistant to corrosion, including hinge pins, fixing screws, springs and screw inserts,” warns Stephenson.

Clearly the same considerations will apply to other outdoor wiring appliances, such as switches, timers, bell pushes on loading bays etc. The key considerations will be the likelihood of exposure to water and dust and the chance of the appliance receiving regular knocks.

With the growing expectation of having access to power outdoors, backed by the legislative force of Part P in the domestic sector, there is a significant opportunity for contractors to add value to the service they offer, as well as adding value to the contract. Thinking ‘outside the building’ as well as ‘outside the box’ will certainly help to generate extra revenue.