Electrical wiring for a house is a step-by-step process on how to wire a house. That is regardless of the source of electricity. The source can either be solar or hydropower.
I will answer the question of how are circuits wired in houses. I will discuss how to wire a house through the listed topics below.
- Electrical house wiring tools.
- House tubing and wiring
- Electric house wiring circuit.
- House electric fitting
- Testing
- Electrical wiring diagram house
- Electrical materials for house wiring
- Electrical house wiring estimate
- Electrical quotation for house wiring.
Table of Contents
- Electrical wiring diagram house.
- Electrical house wiring estimate.
- Electrical materials for house wiring.
- Electrical house wiring tools.
- The uses of the above-listed tools
- House tubing and wiring.
- Materials needed for tubing.
- Step-by-step tubing
- House wiring circuit.
- Types of lighting circuits.
- sockets outlets or power circuits.
- Types of socket outlets power circuits.
- Geyser circuit.
- Air conditioner circuit.
- Cooker control unit.
- House electric fitting.
- what is the standard amperage rating for various circuits?
- TESTING FOR HOUSE WIRING
- Types of house wiring.
- More resources.
Electrical wiring diagram house.
What is an electrical wiring diagram for the house? This is a drawing showing you the electrical layout of the house. The electrical wiring diagram tells you where your sockets outlets, switches and other electrical equipment will be located in the house.
The electrical wiring diagram will also show you the types of electrical light fixtures to be installed in the home. For the homeowner, the electrical wiring diagrams give you a feel of what your house will be when it is wired. To the electrician, the electrical plan guides you on how many circuits you will have in the house and it shows you the exact positions of various electrical components. It is from the electrical wiring diagram that you do your electrical house wiring estimate.
Electrical house wiring estimate.
This is an approximate calculation of what it will cost you to wire your house from start to finish. What does this estimate consist of? Well, the cost of all electrical wiring materials and the labour cost of doing the electrical works.
How do you do this electrical estimate for wiring a house? If you have an electrical wiring diagram, ask your electrical contractor or electrician to give you the electrical quotation of what it will cost you to wire your house. When you don’t have the wiring plan or drawing.
Still, you will invite either the electrical contractor or electrician to your site you show him all the rooms in the house and you tell him what you want to install in each house. There the contractor will generate an electrical quotation for wiring your house.
Electrical materials for house wiring.
These are the materials that you need to do complete electrical wiring for your home. Check out the materials in the video below
Electrical house wiring tools.
In order for any electrical wiring installation in-house or project to be completed successfully, you need to have proper and correct tools for the job. I am going to list basic electrical tools that will help you in electrical wiring installation from start to complete house wiring.
- Measuring tape
- hammer
- chisel
- screwdriver
- multimeter
- Drilling machine
- Angle grinder.
- Fishing wire or tape
- Chalk line
This is a list of basic tools that I personally use in residential house wiring.
The uses of the above-listed tools
Measuring tape.
A measuring tape is a very useful tool in electrical house wiring. This is a tool that you use to measure the heights of your switches, sockets, meter boxes and distribution boards.
- You can use it to mark the positions of your security lights.
- When you use a measuring tape in combination with a spirit level, this ensures that your sockets outlet switches and distribution boards are at the same height and are well levelled.
2. Hammer.
A hammer is a multi-purpose tool. In-house electrical wiring, you use it basically for two major works. That is, for chiselling and fixing saddles.
For fastening saddles and cable clips, you use a claw hammer while for chiselling you use a bigger size hammer like a 4 pounds hammer.
3. Chisels.
Basically, there are two types of chisels that I use when I am doing electrical wiring in the house and related important points. The pointed chisel and the flat one. This tool helps when installing conduit pipes in walls and concretes.
4. Screwdriver.
A screwdriver is used for screwing and unscrewing screws. There are a lot of screwdriver types that are out there.
When I am doing single phase wiring in houses, I use three types of screwdrivers for most of the installations.
- Philips or star screwdriver
- Flathead screwdriver
- Terminal screwdriver.
- It is good to point out that a terminal screwdriver can either be flathead or Philips. The only difference is that a terminal screwdriver is small in size.
When you have these three screwdrivers, you can literally do any basic electrical installation work.
For simple maintenance and testing, I would advise that you include a neon test screwdriver as one of the necessary screwdrivers to have.
5. Multimeter.
6. Drilling machine.
When doing house installation wiring and fixing light fixtures on walls and ceilings, you will need a drilling machine. The drilling machine is handy when you are mounting chandeliers, Hand dryers and many other home appliances.
7. Angle Grinder.
A grinder is a multipurpose tool. It can help you to do a lot of tasks with ease. I personally use it in cutting walls and concrete.
I cut walls because before I do house tubing and wiring or fix conduit pipes into walls and concretes, you need to chisel the walls.
Therefore, you first cut the walls with a grinder, then use a chisel and hammer to remove the cutting. Then you put your conduits in the wall.
8. Fishing wire or tape.
This tool is the one that you use when drawing electrical wires for the home into conduit pipes. It is a handy tool when you are wiring a house and pulling multiple cables through a conduit.
9. Chalk line.
A chalk line is a tool that is useful in making straight lines. I particularly use it for marking the positions for downlights and other light fittings that I install on ceilings.
House tubing and wiring.
Tubing is simply laying conduit pipes in the house. What do I mean when I say putting conduit pipes in the house? Let’s say you have decided on what electrical circuits you will have in a home. What you will do next is to put or create a way or a path in which you are going to wire those circuits.
In a basic house electrical wiring, you have the following circuits as listed below.
- Lighting circuit
- power or socket circuit
- Geyser
- Air conditioning circuit
- Cooker circuit.
There are basically two main types of tubing, concealed wiring mounted and surface mounted. In concealed wiring mounting, you ensure that your conduits are buried in the walls, while in surface mounting, you mount your electrical conduit pipes on the surface of the wall.
Materials needed for tubing.
In order for you to do a good job. You will need the following electrical house wiring materials and accessories.
- Conduit pipes
- couplings
- Loop inboxes
- Bends
- adapters
- saddles
- 3 by 3 GI boxes
- 3 by 6 GI boxes
- 6 BY 6 GI boxes
- ceiling nails
- Meter box
- Distribution box
- PVC glue
After securing the above-listed materials, you proceed to do your tubing. For power or sockets circuits, I would recommend that you do slab tubing, that is, before pouring the concrete on your slab, lay your conduit for the power circuit. This ensures that you use fewer cables when wiring the same circuit.
Step-by-step tubing
Before starting to do your tubing, make sure you know how many lighting circuits you will need. Do the same thing for all the circuits. Then you proceed to lay conduit for each circuit that you will have in your home.
If you have been hired to wire a house for a friend or client, ask them what they would like to have in each room and take it down.
This process will help you in planning your tubing works in the right way. I have found out that by using this method, I have fewer alterations to the final circuits.
Always separate your lighting circuits from the power circuits this makes it easy when the time for doing maintenance work comes.
When you have more than one air conditioner, it’s good practice to give each air conditioner a separate circuit.
It is during the tubing phase that you mount switch boxes, distribution boards meter boxes and lighting points. Electric
House wiring circuit.
Electrical wiring is the process of fishing cables into conduit pipes so that you can bring your circuit wiring into reality.
I will lead you through the process of house electrical wiring from the consumer unit or distribution board to the final individual circuits.
Below is the electrical wiring list of circuit wiring that I will consider.
- Lighting
- sockets
- Geyser
- Cooker
- Air conditioner
Lighting.
Before I continue to talk about the lighting circuit, I would like to say that all the circuits that I will talk about originate from the consumer unit or distribution board.
For a lighting circuit to be complete, it should have the following components.
- Circuit breaker
- Cables or building wiring wire
- Switch
- Load.
The basic lighting circuit, starts from a distribution box, via a circuit breaker, it runs through the conduit pipes to a switch and finally to a load typically a light bulb.
CIRCUIT BREAKER >>>>> SWITCH>>>>>> LIGHT BULB
You run your cable from the circuit breaker to a switch and then from the switch to a light bulb.
From the consumer unit, you run three electric wires for the house, these wires are a live cable, neutral and earth cable
Live wire or cable.
Is a cable that carries current or electricity from the circuit breaker. depending on the number of phases that you intend to install, the colour code for a single-phase house wiring is red or brown.
For a three-phase installation, you have red yellow and blue phases. When wiring lighting circuits, you should ensure that all connections of the live wires are done in the switch.
This makes maintenance works and faults finding easy. Do not join live wires in each and every looping box.
Neutral wire.
Is the return path for electricity from the load. The colour code for this cable is black or blue.
Earth wire.
Is a protective conductor that protects appliances and people from electric shocks and damage. the colour code is either green or green/yellow/bare conductor uninsulated.
Types of lighting circuits.
There are three main types of lighting circuits, these are :
- One way switch
- Two-way switch
- Intermediate switch
ONE WAY SWITCH.
In this type of switching, you have a light position that is controlled by one switch and from one position as shown in the diagram below.
TWO-WAY SWITCH.
With this type of switching system, you have a light point or more that is controlled by two switches. usually called one gang two-way switch. and from two positions. check the diagram below.
Mostly this switching is used in a hallway or a room that has two entrances or doors. At times it is used in corridors.
INTERMEDIATE SWITCHING.
In this system, you have a light point or more being controlled by three switches and from three positions. in order for you to wire this circuit, you will need two( 2) 2-way switches and one intermediate switch.
This system is usually used in areas or rooms that have three entry points or in long corridors.
sockets outlets or power circuits.
When I say socket outlets or power circuits I mean a circuit in your home that usually powers your home appliances like:
- Television set(TV).
- Microwave.
- Refrigerator.
- Charger for a smartphone.
- Laptop.
- Pressing iron.
- Coffee maker.
- Home theatre.
Types of socket outlets power circuits.
There are basically two main types of power circuits. Being ring and radial.
RING CIRCUIT ELECTRICAL WIRING.
In a ring circuit, you run your power cables from the distribution board through all the sockets in that circuit then you run it back to the distribution board.
This system is used to ensure that there is always a continuity of power supply to that circuit.
One main advantage of this system is should there be any fault in one part of the circuit, power will still flow from the other line.
RADIAL CIRCUIT ELECTRICAL WIRING.
In this type of wiring, you run your cables from the distribution board to each and every socket.
How is this, in a radial circuit, the last PowerPoint, does not go back to the distribution board.
You run your cables from the distribution board through each socket outlet and the last socket point does not go back to the distribution board. see the picture below.
Geyser circuit.
Just like in lighting and power circuits, in order for you to wire a geyser circuit, you run your cables from the distribution box to the geyser switch then you run the cable from the geyser switch to the geyser outlet(the point where you connect your geyser).
You can learn how to do geyser switch wiring step by step.
Air conditioner circuit.
In this, I am talking about how you provide power to the air conditioning unit. Mainly split-type mini air conditioners.
You run your power cables from the distribution board to the isolation point or switch, usually the same switches as for a geyser unit.
Then from the switch to the air conditioning point.
Cooker control unit.
A cooker control unit circuit is specifically meant to power a cooker. How do you power it?
As usual, all circuits start from the distribution board.
You run your cables from the distribution board to the cooker control unit switch.
Then you run a cable from the switch to the point where you will connect the cooker. For the cooker circuit, you use three cables Red Black and Green.
Red is the live wire black is the neutral wire and green is the earth or ground wire. Note the new colour code for the neutral wire is blue in single phase circuits.
House electric fitting.
This is a stage or phase in house wiring where you start to install your fixtures. This is usually done after you have finished wiring all your circuits.
How do you proceed with installing the final fixtures? I for one first start by dressing the meter box and distribution board.
For single-phase houses, I usually use a 100A MCB as my income, which is the circuit breaker that supplies power from the meter box to the rest of the circuits in the house. At times I use a 62A MCB depending on the load in that house.
How do you arrange the circuit breakers?
You start by mounting your incomer then followed by the rest of the circuit breakers, starting with the highest rated amperage end with the list or smallest rated amperage circuit breaker.
MAIN
COOKER
SOCKETS
AIR CONDITIONER
GEYSER
LIGHTS.
This is just a guide, if you have two cookers, you have to mount two circuit breakers for the two cookers.
This follows for all the circuits. That is if you have three lighting circuits, you have to put three circuit breakers one for each circuit.
why do you have to do this? You do this in order to avoid overloading the circuits.
what is the standard amperage rating for various circuits?
| LOAD | AMPERAGE(A) |
| MAIN MCB | 100 |
| COOKER | 32 |
| SOCKETS | 32 |
| GEYSER | 16/20 |
| AC | 20 |
| LIGHTING | 10 |
These MCB ratings are strictly for house wiring in the 230V system.
INSTALLING SOCKETS AND SWITCHES
When I finish dressing the distribution board, I start to install sockets and switches.
I would advise you to start installing switches and sockets after the house has been painted with the first coat but before the final coat. This is done so that your sockets and switches are not stained with paint.
INSTALLING LIGHT FITTINGS FOR HOME WIRING
After installing sockets and switches, it’s time to start mounting light fittings. Where you start first is a personal preference. Below is a list of light fittings that you may mount or install.
- Pendant lighting with ceiling rose
- Fluorescent fittings
- Downlights
- chandeliers
- Bulkhead
- Strip lights
CHANDELIERS.
When you are installing chandeliers, I would suggest that you do not assemble the chandelier on the ground, instead start assembling it to the point where you want to install it.
Why is it so? chandeliers become heavy when you assemble them as a result, they pose a challenge when installing them. And it might take you a long time to install.
DOWNLIGHTS.
Most downlights come in a recessed manner. Therefore, when installing downlights you should cut through the ceiling.
This requires you to use the correct size of a hole saw. When you use the wrong hole saw you might find it difficult to install downlights.
TESTING FOR HOUSE WIRING
Why is it important to test a new installation? Testing your installation ensures that your newly wired house is in good condition and ready to be occupied.
The ultimate goal is to make sure that your house is safe and free from electrical shocks and hazards. Safety for people and appliances.
Below is a list of tests to be conducted in a newly wired house.
- Continuity test
- Insulation resistance test
- Polarity Test
- Earth loop impedance test
Learn more about electrical house wiring here.
Types of house wiring.
There are a lot of house wiring styles. The most common ones are surface house wiring and concealed electrical house wiring.
In concealed electrical house wiring, you conceal all the electrical conduit pipes and accessories in walls. While in surface electrical house wiring, you install conduit pipes and electrical cables on the surface of the wall.
More resources.
Should you have any questions or experience, feel free to share in the comments below.
Very valuable information, it’s not at all blogs that we
find this, congratulations I was searching for something like this and found it here.
King regards,
Dinesen Zacho
Valuable information here 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
Thank you Mukomi Muunyu.for finding valuable information in this post.
Great note…..
Keep it up….
God bless you…
Thank you Felix Jim Attipoe
alhamdulillah ..very useful information here.
thanks to addmin or electric officer
Hi Foyjur! Thank you for taking the time to read the blog.