Old Style Fuse Box

1) One of the many questions we are asked by customers is about the age of their fuse box. 

A lot of our customers are concerned about the age of their electrics and in particular their OLD STYLE FUSE BOX and rightly so.

Whilst electrics are not a fun thing to spend money on, they are a vital system in our homes that requires maintenance, repair and replacement in order to work SAFELY and properly. It is so easy to forget about the electrical systems in our home as we take it for granted. It performs its job year after year without a hint of a complaint, in complete silence and never gives any trouble. Electrical systems, if looked after, will give many decades of useful service without problems. 

The old fuse box in the photograph here is typical of that installed in many properties across the country. These fuse boxes are almost as good as modern ones at protecting against short circuit faults in your wiring. This means that they can detect a very large electrical current in a circuit that should not be there and safely disconnect the power to the circuit.

Unfortunately, their usefulness sort of ends there. The fuse box above provides little to no electric shock protection without other methods being installed in your home. It provides little to no fire protection either and does not protect against damaging electrical surges from ruining cables and equipment in your home. This fuse box is many decades old now and as with everything, things move on and much better and safer equipment is available to us to keep us and our homes safe from electrical dangers. 

From an electrical safety point of view, some of these old fuse boxes may indeed still “pass” an electrical safety inspection assuming that there is adequate electric shock protection installed. Most however, are simply too outdated to offer sufficient protection for modern day homes and equipment.

Electric shock protection is a vital part of the safety of an electrical system I think we can all agree on that! 
Electric shock protection can take the form of: 

• Lots of earth wires connecting all parts of the electrical installation together to prevent differences in voltage giving a shock risk AND / OR an electric shock protection device installed at or in the consumer unit which trips when it senses a problem. 
• There are other methods of electric shock protection in our electrical systems but these two are the most common and useful. 

We do often see an OLD STYLE FUSE BOX still working in homes and providing service to the users and their equipment. This tends to be the case when the electrical system has not been altered or added to over the years. Original electrical installations if well installed can last for many decades. 

2) Do I need my fuse box changed?

If we look at the question from a point of view of an Electrical Safety Check then it is likely that many of the electrical installations containing these older style fuse boxes will not pass an electrical safety check for one reason or another. Just because you have an older style fuse box DOES NOT MEAN that it needs to be changed. The only way to know for sure if you require an updated fuse box (consumer unit) is to have an electrical inspection carried out by a suitably qualified professional. The electrical check will not only look at your consumer unit / fuse box but also all of the circuits that are connected to it. 

3) What else does an electrical safety check do?

An electrical safety check will look at the safety earthing (the escape path for dangerous electrical currents), the condition of the electrical accessories and equipment, the condition of the cabling in the fabric of the building and highlight any potential dangers or actual dangers that exist. 

4) Do I get a report?

Yes. An in-depth report is produced on the condition on the electrical installation which will be between 5 and 9 pages in length normally. This report can vary wildly from electrician to electrician. The veracity and depth of the report is something that is not monitored by any agency or body and as such electrical inspections can range from very useful to completely useless. It is important to find an electrician that you can trust to properly inspect your home for dangers and give you an honest and open opinion on the safety of your electrical installation. 

5) My fuse box is plastic, is this dangerous?

No. Unless there are signs of thermal damage. A plastic fuse board is not dangerous. All new consumer units (fuse board, fuse box, distribution board, trip switch box) that are installed these days are made of metal as the wiring regulations NOW require that all enclosures are to be made from non-combustible material. Just because you have a plastic consumer unit does not mean that it needs to be changed. 

6) Can you tell if a fuse box needs changing without me paying for an inspection?

Sometimes. If you contact us, we can ask you for photographs and try to determine from that. 😊 

7) Where can I read more about this?

If you would like some more information about electrical inspections then follow this link:

https://www.electricalfaultsfixed.co.uk/helpsheet/eicr-what-expect

If you have any questions about an OLD STYLE FUSE BOX or anything electrical related then you are more than welcome to give us a call or get in touch on our contact page. Don’t worry, we won’t put you on a list and sell your details, we also won’t harass you until the end of time to try and sell you things. We don’t have the energy for that .

We are always happy to offer no obligation free advice to any customer, old or new and genuinely just want to help. 

Click here to go to our contact page:

https://www.electricalfaultsfixed.co.uk/contact

Or call us here.