Chapter 1

Accessories

Introduction

From the user’s point of view the electricity service in a building consists of light
switches, sockets, clock connectors, cooker control units and similar outlets. Such fittings
are collectively known as accessories; this name came about because they are accessory
to the wiring, which is the main substance of the installation from the designer’s and
installer’s point of view. To them, the way the outlets are served is the major interest, but
it is quite secondary to the user who is concerned only with the appearance and function
of the outlet. In the complete electrical installation of a building the wiring and
accessories are interdependent and neither can be fully understood without the other; a
start has to be made somewhere however, and in this book it is proposed to consider
accessories first.

Switches

A switch is used to make or interrupt a circuit. Normally when one talks of switches one
has in mind light switches which turn lights on and off. A complete switch consists of
three parts. There is the mechanism itself, a box containing it, and a front plate over it.
The box is fixed to the wall, and the cables going to the switch are drawn into the box.
After this the cables are connected to the mechanism. To carry out this operation the
electrician must pull the cables away from the wall sufficiently to give himself room to
work on the back of the mechanism. He then pushes the mechanism back into the box
and the length of cable that he had to pull out from the wall becomes slack inside the box.
It is therefore important that the box is large enough to accommodate a certain amount of
slack cable at the back of the mechanism.
Standard boxes for recessing within a wall are 16, 25, 35 and 47mm deep. Sometimes
the wiring is done not in the depth of the structural wall, but within the thickness of the
plaster. For use with such wiring, boxes are made 16mm deep (plaster depth boxes). It is
often necessary to install wiring and accessories exposed on the surface of wall. For such
applications surface boxes are made which are both more robust and neater in appearance
than boxes which are to be recessed in walls and made flush with the surface, although
they are made to similar depth. Typical boxes of both types are shown in Figure 1.1.