Electric cables underneath garden Ask questions and find answers to many subjects relating to electrics and electrical work

[D-Mac]

Hello,

I would like to route a couple of electric cables through the garden below ground. The cables will run in plastic conduit and will be buried to a good depth with concrete protection over the top.

Is there a limit to how many cables can be fed through one piece of conduit? I understand that temperatures can increase if several cables are grouped close together and wondered if this would place a limit on the quantity in a plastic tube. Is there a recommendation for the diameter of the tube required?

By the way, one cable is a mains feed to an outbuilding for lights and sockets and the other is just for low voltage garden lights.

Thanks in advance.

[ericmark]

There are recommendations but for what you are doing it will not really matter main thing is why we use a duct. It is not to protect the cables the sand and tiles placed on top does that quite nicely. It is to allow them to be replaced without digging up the garden again. Often placed under drives, ponds etc when very hard to dig up and it needs to be straight and terminate in a manhole or the like or either end to be free to dig down with the latter often with expending foam seals at the ends to stop dirt entering.
If you have no areas which need crossing like driveways then no real point of using a duct. SWA cable is quite happy being laid on sand covered with sand and then tiles with electric cable below printed on them.
Eric

[D-Mac]

Great. Thanks for your advice. I guess that the larger the duct the easier it will be to insert additional cables in future if they are required.

Thanks Eric.

[ericmark]

Don't forget some rope to pull them through.
Eric