The French electrical code: books and websites.
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RobertArthur
- Posts: 1585
- Joined: Sat Jul 17, 2021 3:10 pm
- Location: Nièvre
The French electrical code: books and websites.
@ Hughnique, I see your point. It's not my taste, but trunking these days is not too ugly. And for an aménagemet des combles or bringing electricity to a barn there is another option: install a tableau secondaire. As soon as you run out of capacitity of the existing circuits prises and éclairage there is indeed an aesthetic problem, where to hide those extra gaines, construction problems.
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hughnique
- Posts: 1102
- Joined: Mon Aug 23, 2021 1:47 pm
- Location: Saumur
The French electrical code: books and websites.
Must admit that doesn't look too bad, but I bet it's not cheap, and of course providing you can get all the little extra cosmetic touches, to finish it off.
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RobertArthur
- Posts: 1585
- Joined: Sat Jul 17, 2021 3:10 pm
- Location: Nièvre
The French electrical code: books and websites.
About electrical codes in Europe, no, not about the ring circuit compared to the others. About what surprised me when I visited Paris for the first time, in the sixties. In our hotel in Montmartre, a lot of creaking wooden stairs and every floor equipped with something that would not have looked out of place in a doll's house: a wooden board with little fuse holders and a tangle of thin wiring with cotton insulation. In our hotel room only one light switch and one socket. Warning in red: Sèche-cheveux interdit! The necessity of having all kinds of signs with rules on how to act in case of fire slowly began to dawn on me.
Since that time every update of the French regs made them to what they are today: rather complex, trying to cover every conceivable security and safety situation. To be on the safe side so many detailed regs that you sometimes wonder, isn't this overdoing it a bit?
The separate circuits for prises and éclairage take a lot of wiring, The price of copper sky-high these days, I heard electricians from other countries in the EU complaining: this is expensive, almost twice the wiring we need in our country. Taking into account the extinction of Mr. Edison's invention, only LEDs allowed, the power consumption of this kind of lighting is very low.. Why not the same circuit? Also an eco benefit: there is simply not enough copper in the world, shortages on the horizon, further price rises.
Germany is known for it's strict bureaucracy, regs are regs, "Gründlichkeit". Nevertheless the VDE electrical code doesn't see any harm in using the same circuit for both purposes. No detailed prescriptions about the exact number of sockets and points d'éclairage as in France. They have a more practical approach, a quote:
"
What empirical values can you count on?
" The following empirical values are often used for normal use of the socket in a flat and fusing the circuits with 16 amps each. Calculate an average load of 200 to 300 watts per single socket and 300 to 500 watts per double socket. If you divide the maximum possible total load of approximately 3,600 watts by these individual loads, you get the number of sockets per fuse. Bear in mind, however, that even one heavy consumer in the circuit can throw the planning out of kilter. If it is foreseeable that several consumers with high loads are to be operated simultaneously on the respective circuit, reduce the number of sockets in this circuit already in the planning."
Almost the same in the Netherlands: each earth-leakage breaker followed by a max of four MCBs of 16 A, feeding a mix of sockets and lights. And of course in both countries also something the French are particularly fond of: circuits specialisés. But not so many.
A last remark: what takes them so long here in France to finally say au revoir to the AC type Interrupteur Différentiel? In many countries in the EU alrady phased out in the late nineties by the A type or better.
To conclude: questions to forget. Why? The answer has been given by Charles de Gaulle in a slightly other context: " Il faut prendre les choses comme elles sont, car on ne fait pas de politique autrement que sur des réalités. "
Since that time every update of the French regs made them to what they are today: rather complex, trying to cover every conceivable security and safety situation. To be on the safe side so many detailed regs that you sometimes wonder, isn't this overdoing it a bit?
The separate circuits for prises and éclairage take a lot of wiring, The price of copper sky-high these days, I heard electricians from other countries in the EU complaining: this is expensive, almost twice the wiring we need in our country. Taking into account the extinction of Mr. Edison's invention, only LEDs allowed, the power consumption of this kind of lighting is very low.. Why not the same circuit? Also an eco benefit: there is simply not enough copper in the world, shortages on the horizon, further price rises.
Germany is known for it's strict bureaucracy, regs are regs, "Gründlichkeit". Nevertheless the VDE electrical code doesn't see any harm in using the same circuit for both purposes. No detailed prescriptions about the exact number of sockets and points d'éclairage as in France. They have a more practical approach, a quote:
"
What empirical values can you count on?
" The following empirical values are often used for normal use of the socket in a flat and fusing the circuits with 16 amps each. Calculate an average load of 200 to 300 watts per single socket and 300 to 500 watts per double socket. If you divide the maximum possible total load of approximately 3,600 watts by these individual loads, you get the number of sockets per fuse. Bear in mind, however, that even one heavy consumer in the circuit can throw the planning out of kilter. If it is foreseeable that several consumers with high loads are to be operated simultaneously on the respective circuit, reduce the number of sockets in this circuit already in the planning."
Almost the same in the Netherlands: each earth-leakage breaker followed by a max of four MCBs of 16 A, feeding a mix of sockets and lights. And of course in both countries also something the French are particularly fond of: circuits specialisés. But not so many.
A last remark: what takes them so long here in France to finally say au revoir to the AC type Interrupteur Différentiel? In many countries in the EU alrady phased out in the late nineties by the A type or better.
To conclude: questions to forget. Why? The answer has been given by Charles de Gaulle in a slightly other context: " Il faut prendre les choses comme elles sont, car on ne fait pas de politique autrement que sur des réalités. "