Potentially awkward EV charger home install - Anyone else?

[Sebbak]

Before I run about getting quotes etc, I was wondering about other people that may have had a non-standard home charger install. I appreciate that every situation is somewhat unique, but basically I'm in a position where our consumer unit is next to the front door inside a small cupboard and parking is to the rear of the house. Probably talking as a dead straight line, about 15m or so from consumer unit to parking area.

It's an end of terrace, so I have a little alley way/gap with dead end between me and the neighbour that I assume the cable could run externally, but the consumer unit is the 'wrong' side of the front door for the alley, so not sure how awkward that makes things (common sense suggests probably not a huge issue, part of brain think may be a pain for the installer).

Obviously this will likely fall into a 'custom' install rather than standard, but I wondered if anyone had any experience with a similar situation and if there's any tips/info they may have that might help smooth out things before install day?

I'll be contacting various installers for quotes soon, but any info from experience would be handy in advance!

[gmaz]

Where is your meter?

[Sebbak]

gmaz said:

Where is your meter?

The meter is pretty much the same spot as the consumer unit, just outside instead of inside.

[tr3a]

Is there a crawl space under the floor? That gave me great flexibility when installing a charger. Go down, through the crawl space, drill a hole in the outside wall and let it come up wherever the charger needs to be.

[Sebbak]

tr3a said:

Is there a crawl space under the floor? That gave me great flexibility when installing a charger. Go down, through the crawl space, drill a hole in the outside wall and let it come up wherever the charger needs to be.

Unfortunately not, as it's a new build so the floor isn't boarded. I think it might be easiest to run an external cable up and over the door, around and down the little alley and along a wall we have. Hoping to have the charger on the wall as opposed to the house to be closer to the parking space/gate. I guess I won't really know options without talking to a professional, but handy to know if people have had similar or are thinking a bit more out of the box than I am!

[gmaz]

Sebbak said:

Unfortunately not, as it's a new build so the floor isn't boarded. I think it might be easiest to run an external cable up and over the door, around and down the little alley and along a wall we have. Hoping to have the charger on the wall as opposed to the house to be closer to the parking space/gate. I guess I won't really know options without talking to a professional, but handy to know if people have had similar or are thinking a bit more out of the box than I am!

It maybe more tidy to run it under the paving stones(?) at the front and round to the side. Depending on how big your meter cupboard is, you can add another small consumer unit, or perhaps a weatherproof one just outside the meter.

[Ste-EVo]

I wouldn't have thought the cable would look all too pleasant on the eye if you ran it up and around the door on the outside, is there no way to run it under the door step? We live in a new build too so I know the thresholds tend to be pretty flush to the floor so it may be difficult.
Our meter box is on the side of our house and the installer just ran the cable from that amd clipped it lowdown on the brickwork so shouldn't be any need to touch your consumer box (if that helps at all...)
If it's not too much of a distance it might be worth lifting the paving and burying the cable, but I'd imagine prices could vary massively for that.

If you need a none standard install id suggest getting a company out to do the survey and advise.

[CharlieAlphaMike]

Anything 'can' be done of course but the only way you're ever going to know, is by getting an electrician to look at the job.

You can 'surface clip' a Steel Wire Armour (SWA) cable on an outside wall without too much trouble but it might look unsightly.

Or, to avoid a long run of visible cables outside, it might be possible to go up, rather than out and down the alleyway. I mean, go up and then under the floorboards, then out and down the back wall to the charger.

[Sebbak]

Thanks all, I think I may have a solution to run the cable externally (it's fine, it can be hidden quite easily by a run of plants to the front of the house).

We have a small step down to the front door in brick, so I'm assuming we can get a cable run from the meter outside, down and around the inside of the stepdown (it's about 2 slabs in size); and back around the front/down the side of the house. A bit faffy I imagine, as I assume the cabling isn't super bendy for the most part, but think that would likely work.

As other have said, I'll have a chat with the installer beforehand to discuss everything, but the tips have been handy. Thanks

[frisbee]

My cable runs from the meter box, around some steps, along the front of my house and to the charger at the side. About 15m in total.

At some point I'll chase it into the step and plant some plant things in the flower bed along the front of my house.

[Ste-EVo]

Sebbak said:

Thanks all, I think I may have a solution to run the cable externally (it's fine, it can be hidden quite easily by a run of plants to the front of the house).

We have a small step down to the front door in brick, so I'm assuming we can get a cable run from the meter outside, down and around the inside of the stepdown (it's about 2 slabs in size); and back around the front/down the side of the house. A bit faffy I imagine, as I assume the cabling isn't super bendy for the most part, but think that would likely work.

As other have said, I'll have a chat with the installer beforehand to discuss everything, but the tips have been handy. Thanks

Sounds good then. The cable isn't bendy but can be bent up to 90 degrees within reason I believe but I'm not electrician, just going off what I was told.

Here is mine to give an example of the cable

[essayer]

If it doesn’t need mechanical protection (perhaps you can run above head height externally) there’s ‘hi tuff’ type cable which is thinner than SWA

[tr3a]

Sebbak said:

tr3a said:

Is there a crawl space under the floor?

Unfortunately not, as it's a new build so the floor isn't boarded.

That's odd. My house has an insulated concrete ground floor. There's a hatch (also insulated) to the crawl space under the mat by the front door. All houses round here are like that.

[nute]

My meter is at the back of the house, driveway at the front. The fitter just ran the cable around the building incl a 90 degree external angle with no problem. The distance is around 13- 15m as a guess. No problems getting it fitted except I had to run to the local electrical store to get a length of anti trip cable protector to run from the wall to the car. The fitter wouldn't certify it complete without this.

[Pizzaeatingking]

Sebbak said:

Thanks all, I think I may have a solution to run the cable externally (it's fine, it can be hidden quite easily by a run of plants to the front of the house).

We have a small step down to the front door in brick, so I'm assuming we can get a cable run from the meter outside, down and around the inside of the stepdown (it's about 2 slabs in size); and back around the front/down the side of the house. A bit faffy I imagine, as I assume the cabling isn't super bendy for the most part, but think that would likely work.

As other have said, I'll have a chat with the installer beforehand to discuss everything, but the tips have been handy. Thanks

Doesn't sound too bad from the sounds of it, get a couple of guys round to quote and see which comes up with the best route. Sometimes someone thinks outside the box.

Sounds better than my run though, round the front of my terrace house, up to the loft, over and back down the other side and through the garden.

[phil4]

Mine was pretty non-standard. Incoming mains, meter and CU are in the middle of the house under the stairs. It's not on or even close to an outside wall.

They ran the cables upthrough the bottom of the stairs to the landing upstairs, pulled up the floorboards, and wired through to the airing cupboard, then just inside that up into the loft. Across the loft under the boards, and down out the side of the house. In through the garage roof, and across the ceiling of the garage at the front, to the charger on the outside of the garage.

I had this done when they were installing solar and batteries, so they were also running cables for those at the same time, so can't give you a price as such, but it only added £1000 to the bill (the charger was a Zappi, so about 750).