Decided to bury the cables in the wall

[ChrisD.]

I always hated having the cables between the TV and the back of the cabinet so I decided while having the wall painted to put power and HDMI behind the plasterboard. Having never done anything like this before I started hacking away.

You can see the two cuts here, and using a tool I bought from Amazon I managed to thread it all the way through. There about 1-2 cm gap between the plaster and the wall behind so I'm not sure I will be able to get a HDMI cable behind it. I've ordered a low profile one and 5m so I'll give that a go tomorrow or over the weekend.

I decided not to cut the plug off the TV and use that. It's an LG so hard wired into the back so I didn't want to be left without the option of removing the TV down the line. So I've hacked open a spare extension cable and used that instead. I'll have to get a single head as having the full 4 gang behind the TV is a little excessive.

Not only did I manage to thread it through the first time, pull the cable back through I managed to get it back and ready for the HDMI cable.

And here's what the sorry state of affairs looks like now. Looking forward to getting my living room back!

 

[ChrisD.]

Better be careful, that does not meet regulation Group 522.6, relating to RCD protection of cables concealed in walls or partitions, forms part of BS 7671:2008+A3:2015 (Seventeenth Edition of the IET Wiring Regulations), which was published on 1 January 2015 and comes into effect on 1 July 2015.

Running mains cables inside a wall has pretty strict regulations covering it now.

Should the worse case scenario happen and a fire breaks out, you could well find yourself uninsured if regulations have not been followed.

Should be in proper trunking and power and data should be separated.

Power MUST be protected by an RCD if cable is hidden in a wall.


http://electrical.theiet.org/wiring-matters/54/cables-in-walls/index.cfm

Dammit. I'll read up on this tomorrow.

 

[ChrisD.]

How will I know if it is? It's a new build?

The plaster is around 100mm deep so it's over 50mm.

I've never had an issue running power and HDMI together as long as the TV isn't powering anything off USB which it isn't.

 

[ChrisD.]

Well it's pretty much done now.

 

[ChrisD.]

Cheers.

I like them, otherwise it's just a big white surface top with nothing on it. Besides, I don't have a sideboard in the living room so I don't really have anywhere to store anything.

 

[ChrisD.]

It would slightly annoy me that I could see the plug socket, did you think about moving it down 50mm or so?

Yeah it annoys me as well, sadly it can't be moved due to regulations.

 

[ChrisD.]

But its your home, you should be free to do what you want with it...

True but I am not competent enough to do the work and no qualified sparky will do it. I might find something small to sit on top and hide the plug.