Hi All,
I'm hoping someone may be able to help me. We're thinking of replacing our existing gas only cooker with a dual fuel one. Before I do this I want to understand what KW the existing cooker circuit is capable of carrying. At the moment the cooker circuit appears to flow only to a double socket on the kitchen wall and has been used occasionally for small appliances.
The question I have is whether there is a way of determining the amp rating for the cooker circuit. The consumer unit clearly shows which one is the cooker circuit but it has no label on the MCB to confirm the amp rating. The only thing I can just about make out is that, just below the 'ON' marking there is a number 30 on the top of the MCB for the cooker, a 15 on the one marked for the immersion heater and a 6 on the one for the ground floor lighting and I'm wondering if these are the amp ratings. I do have a picture of this but I haven't been able to upload it here.
The specification for the cooker we're looking at says that it must be connected "to a suitable double - pole control unit with a minimum rating of 30A"
I understand that a 6mm cable is OK for this, but I'm hoping that we have what we need in place without the need for any new wiring and will only need to add the pole control unit in place of the existing socket.
Is there any way of confirming this from the consumer box? or would I need to isolate the circuit at the consumer unit and open up the socket in the kitchen to see what size cable feeds it?
If it's the latter, can anyone advise how I measure the cable to determine its size? I've read somewhere that the measurement should be the "cross section", however I'm not sure what this means. Does this include the outer sleeving on the whole cable, or do I look only at the size of the live, neutral or earth cables inside the outer sleeve? If so, do I only measure the core copper part or the sleeve as well?
Any guidance would be appreciated.
Thanks in advance.