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Electrical Usability Plan (Electrical Plan)
Q) Why should a prospect owner bother about 'Electrical Plan'?
Electrical System in a building is like the nervous system of a human body. Hence a 'Prospect Owner' should give a lot of importance to Electrical Plan.
Diagram 1: Human Nervous System & Electrical 'Nervous System'
Q) What is meant by Electrical Plan in construction?
Electrical Plan consists of the following:
a) Identification of all required electrical points in a building.
b) Identification of all required electrical materials for the given electrical points.
c) Design of electrical points at various positions in a building.
d) Design of electrical wire (called as Wiring Diagram) based on the load.
e) Design of Main Board with MCBs and ELCB based on the load.
Q) Who has to prepare the Electrical Plan?
An Architect should normally prepare the Electrical Plan. But as far as we know, many not-so-professional builders use Architects who don’t even know the expansion of MCB or the purpose of Fuse.
Q) Why don’t not-so-professional builder prepare Electrical Plan?
There are several reasons for this:
a) Not-so-professional builder assumes that the electrician is extremely knowledgeable and leaves the entire electrical plan and implementation to them.
b) Many customers never demand for Electrical Plan. The not-so-professional builder takes this as an advantage and doesn’t provide one.
c) Skilled Electricians in construction industry is very less. Any one who can lay the wires and fit the electrical items becomes an electrician.
d) If a builder focuses on Electrical Plan, his cost may shoot up and will incur loss in his profit.
There are some more unpleasant reasons which need not be explained here.
Q) This Electrical Plan looks like a new concept. Why should a customer demand for Electrical Plan?
Yes, this is a new concept, not followed even by some professional builders.
The customer should demand for Electrical Plan because:
a) The customer can give complete requirements at the beginning to the builder about all his electrical needs.
b) The builder can do a proper estimation of all electrical materials and provide a better cost estimate.
c) The Electrician can decide which wire to use for what purpose, which MCB to use for what circuit, etc.
d) The Electrical Plan would help customer achieve safety, follow standards and make it scalable.
e) Once a building is built, after few years the same electrician may not be available for servicing the building. If a new Electrician services to fix any issue or do some expansion, the Electrical Plan prepared during building construction would be of great help.
f) Last but not the least, the customer can save lot of money if proper Electrical Plan is done.
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STEP1: First a 3D view of the building is drawn. |
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Note in STEP1:
The above 3D view is drawn with objects like sofa, cot, dining table,
TV stand, etc. Without these objects, finding the position of the
Electrical Points will be difficult. |
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STEP2: Electrical Points at various points are marked in the drawing for each and every room. |
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Note in STEP2:
These diagrams would be part of the “Wall Plan” also as described in
the previous section. The more accurate these drawings are, the less
rework for all departments in building construction. So enough time
has to be spent for this Electrical Plan. |
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(for better view – the last picture above is magnified in this one) |
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Note: In the above picture, only simple representation of the electrical
points is done using the alphabets (Q, R, S, T, U and V). It is
difficult and confusing to explain here all the details. So a separate
spread sheet should be used as given below for the same. |
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STEP3: Detailed description of each and every point is documented in a spread sheet. |
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Note in STEP3:
The 1st column (#) in the above spread sheet tells the serial number.
It wil provide the total number of electrical points in a building.
This will be useful to cross check whether all the switches are equal
to the number of electrical points in the building.
2nd column (Floor) tells which floor (GF means Ground Floor) the electrical point belongs to.
3rd column (Part) is the alphabet used in the previous step (to define
the electrical point). It will start from A and go on till all the
points are completed. (after Z, it will become AA, AB, etc).
4th column (Type) tells the part name including the rating of the
part. If sorting is done, it would be easier to find out the number of
each part required.
5th column (Purpose) is where the customer will review and provide
inputs. This column would also help in arriving at the correct rated
switch and wire. It also tells the electrician which connections must
be part of Inverter / Generator /UPS line. This may not be applicable
if the entire house is connected to one centralized high wattage
Generator (meaning in case of power failure, the entire house may get
power supply from the generator).
6th column (POS) describes what the position of the switch or socket
is. There must be a protocol followed while designing the position of
each and every switch. For example, the first top most switch in a
switch board should be a switch for a light.
7th column (Count) tells the number of such switches or plugs, etc needed. This will help in estimation.
8th column (RM) signified the number of modules each component will
need. There is a switch which will require two modules or just one
module. Depending on the requirement, this can be arrived at.
9th column (Box Type) is just a representation of the switch board
box. Because there are vertical boxes and horizontal boxes. Depending
on the requirement, a vertical box or horizontal box can be choosen.
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| STEP4: Wiring diagram is prepared and MCBs are decided. |
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| STEP5: Estimation is prepared for materials and cost of the materials.
After review of the Electrical Plan and the estimates, the plan is
implemented. |
| Q) The above steps in Electrical Plan preparation look exhaustive. Neither the builder nor the 'Prospect Owner' may have the patience to prepare this. Is there any work-around?
Finding a work around where huge amount of money is involved is not advisable. But we know it is difficult to follow all the steps in Electrical Plan.
So I suggest doing the following if you don’t have patience to follow all the steps:
a) Draw 3D plan with objects. (this will help get a better idea about what should be where)
b) Prepare the spread sheet with all electrical points (with all the 9 columns described)
c) Give it to the Electrician to take further steps – logically.
Q) What are the benefits in Electrical Plan preparation?
Some of the benefits are:
1) Customer will know what all are required for his Dream Home in terms of Electrical Items.
2) Customer can get a better estimation for Electrical Items.
3) By proper selection of Switches, Wires, MCBs, etc. the home will become safer.
4) The Electrical System can be scalable (meaning, in future if you wish to add few more points, it is possible and easier to do it).
5) The rework in electrical work is negligible.
6) Electricians and builders would save time and money if proper planning is done.
Q) What are the common mistakes few electricians do in building construction?
a) Not planning for enough switches in a switch board.
b) Not following electrical wire standards (like red wire for phase1, yellow wire for phase2, blue wire for phase3, black wire for neutral and green wire for earth).
c) Not following electrical wire thickness standards Different gauge thickness should be used for different circuits. For example, an A/C circuit which would draw more current should have higher thickness wire compared to a circuit which has just tubelight and fan.
d) Not isolating the circuits properly. For example, a separate circuit for bedroom, another separate for Kitchen, etc.
e) Not using proper MCBs in the main board. For example, a circuit where the maximum current drawn would be 5A may require just a 6A MCB. Some electricians may put a 10A MCB or 16A MCB. This will defeat the purpose of placing an MCB and such MCBs will act only as on/off switches.
f) Not providing ELCB for the entire building. This is due to the fact that ELCB will trip if there is a minor leak in any place. To avoid such incidents, they by-pass ELCB or don’t provide ELCB in the main board. It is dangerous to the people residing as electrical accidents may occur.
g) Improper usage of Electrical Pipes inside the wall/concrete which may lead to damage in the circuit or difficult to maintain (like if you like to pull the wire, it may never come out).
h) Not providing a scalable solution. For example, today the number of electrical points in a room may be less. Tomorrow if it increases, the existing electrical system should be able to accommodate it.
i) Not providing enough earthing points in each circuit. This may damage the electronic instruments connected to such electrical points.
j) Not providing good quality materials for both internal purpose and external purpose.
Q) How is that possible to find whether the Electrical Circuits are proper?
An independent organization should do the testing of all Electrical Circuits. As far as I know there is no such organization in India.
Today in India, the 'Prospect Owner' after moving into the house finds out the problem by experiencing it. There must be a system where the 'Prospect Owner' should be able to test the electrical circuits before moving into the house.
Q) What if Electrical Plan is not done?
If the 'Prospect Owner' is willing to take a risk in safety, not worried about cost and not worried about comfortable home, Electrical Plan need not be done.
As mentioned in the beginning, the Electrical System in a building is similar to Nervous System in Human body. If enough care is not given in preparing Electrical Plan the 'Prospect Owner' may face lot of difficulties in future.
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