Renovating a Gite in Brittany

For the last few days I have been installing all the electricity cabling upstairs in the two gites ready for plasterboarding on Monday. It's actually been a bit of a mamouth job. I'd allocated a day, which was very optimistic for doing the wiring for two three bedroomed gites.

French electrics follow the NF C 15-100 standard which details the types of cables, sizes, colour codes, regulations regarding placement, earthing, circuit breakers, specialised circuits, sockets per room, etc. etc. Most of the NF C 15-100 info is in my French Electrics book, L'installation électrique, and on the Promotelec site.

French electrics all run on a spur system (no ring main like in the UK) so there are lots of cables leaving the fuse box, especially when you take into account the specialised circuits for various appliances like the VMC, cooker, washine machine, hot water heater, etc. I think I'm up to about 20 circuits per gite each with a circuit breaker on the end and protected by three RCD devices. Thats alot of cable.

Talking of cables – they are different to the UK. The conductors all the same size and coloured thus:-

• Yellow/Green – Earth
• Blue – Neutral
• Anything else – Phase or Live (generally red, black or brown is used).

In general the cables come either as double sheathed (the black cable in the photo) or as separate wires running through flexible conduit, gaine, (the grey tube). In both cases the number, size (1.5mm, 2.5mm, 6mm, etc.), colour are all available in a multitude of combinations. You can even buy the grey conduit (gaine) empty and draw through your own wires (subject to regulations covering conduit size, wire cross section and number of wires) to create your own combinations. For example I often draw a red and orange wire through gaine for a switch (the phase and the live return to the lamp).

Having used the UK electrics system and the French electrics system I much prefer the French way. I find it much easier to use.

All ready for plasterboarding on Monday.