(mechanical rolling)
(dull electronic humming)
- In this video, we're gonna look at some of the range
of consumer units offered by British General.
We're gonna look at the shower consumer unit,
a recessed consumer unit,
and a fully-loaded, 10-way dual RCD board.
All of the consumer units come in a lovely white finish
which is easily wiped down,
and have a 10 year warranty.
And I can tell you from removing this one from the box,
this is one substantial consumer unit.
What we're gonna do is we're gonna open it up
and look at all the features in there
that will make electrician's life easier.
And we know how we like that a eFIXX.
So I've been assured that this consumer unit
only needs one type of screwdriver
in order to make the connections,
so, therefore, I've got my Slotted Pozzi,
because I'm gonna need it for returning the torque settings
of both my over-current protection devices and main switch,
and I'm gonna use that to remove the lid.
The screws themselves are captive so I shouldn't lose those
as I take that out of the way.
And now we can take a closer look on what's going on
inside the consumer unit.
So let's first look at the two RCDs.
They're both rated at 63 amp,
they are both type A RCDs,
and are rated at 30 milliamps
in order to offer additional protection.
The board comes fully loaded with 10 breakers, all B type.
It comes with one 40, four 32s, two 16s,
and three 6 amp breakers.
Let's take a look at the neutral bars here.
What I really like about all the screws
in this consumer unit, they're all wound back.
So whether it be the neutral bar,
the earth bar, or the breakers themselves,
they're all available to be put the conductor
straight into it with no unwinding of those screws.
We've got a three terminal neutral bar here
in case you wanted to rearrange the board
to have a high integrity circuit,
maybe a steel or armored feed in another consumer unit,
and another really nice touch is
you've got seven neutral connections here and seven here,
even though it's a five-five split,
meaning that you could, say,
potentially have seven circuits on one of your RCDs
and three on the other,
or mix and match to suit.
All of the terminals,
whether they be for the neutral bars or the earth bars,
have a generous size hole.
That hole is there
in order that you can facilitate the cables,
but also, it says in the specification,
allowing you to ferrule the ends as well.
And you know how we like a ferrule a eFFIX.
I like this as well.
This area here
has been purposely left with the main switching breakers
that way in order that if you brought gland in the bottom
or the side,
you've got lots of room to swing round your meter tails
and go into the top of the isolating switch itself.
So look how much room we've got there.
One of the things we often say in consumer units,
there's not enough room,
and they've thought about it
by moving the main switch and the breaker down,
in order to give us nice access round
and into the top of the switch with our tails.
Whilst we're talking about space,
the gap between the din rail
and the back of the consumer unit is huge,
you can get your hand right behind there,
meaning that we can feed our cables down
and dress 'em behind there with no hassle.
Often, things that electricians say,
is there's never enough room.
Well, we've got enough room that side
and we've got enough room here behind the din rail itself.
Here's something I'd like to see more of,
and perhaps even Wonky Joe could appreciate this.
We've actually got an inbuilt spirit level here,
so, obviously, when you're mounting your consumer unit,
you're gonna be absolutely spot-on level.
So, there you are, Joe,
there's something there for you in this one as well.
We've also got a fast-release din rail
with a fixing this side and this side,
that when you loosen it,
again, with our Slotted Pozzi,
as all the screws are in the consumer unit
are all using the same screwdriver,
we can easily shift it
and take off the actual din rail section.
So I think I've clearly demonstrate there
that British General have put a lot of thought
into this consumer unit
to make it easier for the electrician to work within it.
So let's go on and look at, now, the shower board.
Okay, wonderful build quality, again.
Let's open it up.
We've got exactly the same as before,
the Slotted Pozzi screwdriver.
I can undo the lid and all the screws in it,
so I lift it out of the way.
And we've got a B50 amp circuit breaker
provided with the consumer unit.
The RCD is rated at 63 amps, 30 milliamps,
and is an AC type.
Just stop you there.
Just remember that the shower itself
is a resistive load,
and an AC RCD is totally acceptable.
The screws within here,
again, all use the same screwdriver.
They've all backed out,
so, again, the earth bar and the neutral bar,
the screws are backed out,
and they've got those really large holes that we saw before,
that we really like.
And look how many earth terminals you get.
You could put protective bonding conductors,
the gas and water, the main earthing conductor
and CPCs in there.
They've given you a lot of terminals, once again.
It's almost expected now,
tons of room behind the actual din rail itself.
And it uses the same type of fixings
in order that it's quick-release din rail.
So, great thinking yet again,
and this time on the shower board.
Let's move to the recess board next.
So, the build quality from British General continues on
with this recessed consumer unit.
As I open it up,
it's a 10-way.
Got a hundred amp main switch,
probably giving you the ability
to fit RCBOs within this type of consumer unit.
However, we've already gone ahead
and fitted a standard breaker
and retro-fitted a Type Two surge device,
which I'll connect up later.
Just to show you one thing here.
On this one, this has been specified with the ability
to lock it off,
so you can fit a barrel lock.
Maybe this is in a communal area
and you want to control the amount of people
that can get into there by having a locking device.
So we'll fit that next.
Straightforward.
Just pop out this clip here, like so.
And then you fit your barrel device.
So we come out with that.
Just make sure that when you insert this
that you've got the nib pointing straight down,
and the raised edge at the very top.
So that's quite important,
in order that you get it round the right way.
So drop it into position like so,
and it's just a simple case of a nut
in order to tighten it off,
followed by the mechanism itself.
So that can go on and be tightened off.
and then I've got the actual lever section.
Tighten that one up.
So there goes the actual bolt itself.
And then we've got the ability
to actually lock that off, like so.
Okay? So that's nice and straightforward,
in order that you can secure the enclosure.
So let's take the consumer unit cover off
and look at all those key features, now, inside it.
(door clanking)
Let's put the door to one side,
not to scratch it.
So, with the cover removed, then,
okay, you can see that we've got some fixing positions
down either side.
I haven't secured it into place,
so we take it out,
for a number of reasons,
so we can see what's going on.
You have to have a 68 ml depth,
so I'm using a 100 ml baton here,
in order to get it into position.
So, 68 ml deep.
And we've got these lovely three sections at the top
and one at the bottom
that can be taken out,
and we won't need grommet strip,
because you've got these clever little plates
that go in there,
to prevent the cables from chafing in those areas.
I really like that.
So, we would fit it in like so,
(unit snapping into place)
and secure it in the positions required,
to hold it firmly into place.
We've obviously got these nice protections.
We've got our bus bar as well,
so let's put those to one side,
and take that off.
So what I'm gonna do next is make these connections
for this Type Two surge protection device.
In order to do so
I'm gonna need the kit.
So there's the kit,
already pre-wired to the appropriate lengths,
so you can make any errors,
and we're gonna connect this up next.
(packet rustling)
So, I've wired the SPD up
and I've positioned it to the side of the main switch.
Often the SPDs are actually on the end of the consumer unit
and you cut off the actual bus bar in that section.
But we've come across here,
so the bus bar would be fitted under here,
and we've kept the SPD this side of the main switch.
Again, we'd like to know your feelings and thoughts on that,
so remember to comment below.
And what's nice about the kit
is that it keeps the protective earth at under half a meter,
so you haven't got to worry about making those calculations
from the bottom of SPD to the actual earth bar itself.
So the likelihood,
with this type of board with a main switch,
you're gonna be fitting RCBOs.
And in this board, this RCBO here is rated at 32 amps.
It's a type B, it's 30 milliamps,
and it's an A type RCBO.
Also, again, just point it out,
they've got the little spirit level,
as they have in all of these boards,
in order that you can just get it on the wall spot on.
So, I'm very happy to say these BG consumer units
are cram-packed full of features
that make electricians' life easier,
whether it be the screws already being withdrawn,
whether it be the amount of room to get your hand in,
the position of the main switch
so the tails can come round,
or the clever little clip that works as a grommet strip
when you take out those larger holes.
However, as always,
we're interested in your feedback,
so please make sure you leave your comments below.
(mechanical rolling)
(dull electronic humming)