Fitting an electric oven

[Reality Bites]

I just wondered if replacing one hard wired electric over for another is something i legally need a sparky to do or am i OK to do it myself?

I've swapped out my own but need to swap my mother in laws and she's worried about me doing it. If i can assure her it's legal, i'm sure she'll feel better about it.

 

[JohnnyG]

You can do it legally, yes.
The only real issue will be that the manufacturers will specify that it must be installed by a registered/competent electrician which may have implications to the warranty and any insurances should a problem develop.

 

[LeeUK]

So if an electric oven caused my house to go on fire 5 years after installing it, the insurance co will want to see proof that I used a legal registered electrician to install it?

LOL crazy.

 

[JohnnyG]

Unlikely.

 

[Zefan]

It would only be a problem with the insurers if - upon investigation following an incident - it was found that your dodgy connection was to blame.

 

[arknor]

ovens don't tend to fail anyway and when they do it's usually a simple £10-20 fix

Just make sure you get one where you can easily change the oven and grill elements.

if you can wire a plug you can wire a kitchen cooker, the part of the cooker circuit sticking out of the wall is essentially the same as the inside of a plug.

just turn off the power to the whole house instead of just the cooker circuit when you do it.

 

[Steampunk]

You should probably get the wiring checked to make sure it can support the amps required safely. Some ovens just plug into a socket. Some can pull enough amps to melt a 15 amp fuse and need to be wired directly into an isolation switch which then goes to it's own dedicated breaker in the consumer unit.

I can see you might have a problem if you wired a high end oven into older wiring that was specced for a low end oven years ago.

 

[arknor]

he can just check what amp the circuit breaker is and see how thick the cable behind the cooker circuit is himself rather than paying someone else.

it's highly unlikely his cooker circuit is only 15amp

BTW any cooker you buy won't come with a cable to deter people from fitting them, most warranties will actually say a "competent adult" rather than qualified electrician.

you can get a cable in wilkos just tell them what you need based on the max amp draw off the cooker

 

[Reality Bites]

Cheers all. I fitted mine so know it's not difficult but my in law was worrying.

I will check the fly lead from the wall for issues and if it needs changing I will call a sparky. If it's fine, I'll fit myself.