Advice on locating underground electric cable

Colm R

Hopefully I am posting in the correct forum. I need some advice on locating and safely working around the electricity supply to my house.

The house was built around 1977, and I've recently purchased it. Its a rural location. The electricity supply enters the property from the field to the rear of the house, attached to your normal pole, and then proceeds underground from there to the ESB Box.

The ESB box is located at the gable end of the house, but at the other side. A picture is a thousand words, so I have attached a diagram of the back garden.




What I need to figure out is:

1. What is the route that the cable takes from point A to B? Most likely as the crow flies?

2. Work out how deep the cable is buried?

3. My electrician informed me that he cannot touch this, as up to the point that it enters the ESB Box, it is the property of the ESB. Does this mean that ESB Networks may have a record of the route of the cable?


Why I need to figure this out is because the back garden is sloped downhill towards the house and is in need of some drainage trenches being dug out. So this leads me to my next question:

4. If I need to re-route the cable to run along the perimeter of the garden, how do I go about this? (Not me personally, I'm not going to touch this wire). And where can I get an idea of how much the ESB will charge for disconnecting, rerouting and reconnecting.


This weekend I do plan on making some investigative digs to see what I can find out, being very careful.

aujopimur

If you hire/borrow a cable locating thingy it will show the route of the cable
To reroute the cable you'll supply and install the new duckting with a draw wire, ESB networks will do the rest, subject to consultation & payment.

glynf

Colm R wrote: »

Hopefully I am posting in the correct forum. I need some advice on locating and safely working around the electricity supply to my house.

The house was built around 1977, and I've recently purchased it. Its a rural location. The electricity supply enters the property from the field to the rear of the house, attached to your normal pole, and then proceeds underground from there to the ESB Box.

The ESB box is located at the gable end of the house, but at the other side. A picture is a thousand words, so I have attached a diagram of the back garden.




What I need to figure out is:

1. What is the route that the cable takes from point A to B? Most likely as the crow flies?

2. Work out how deep the cable is buried?

3. My electrician informed me that he cannot touch this, as up to the point that it enters the ESB Box, it is the property of the ESB. Does this mean that ESB Networks may have a record of the route of the cable?


Why I need to figure this out is because the back garden is sloped downhill towards the house and is in need of some drainage trenches being dug out. So this leads me to my next question:

4. If I need to re-route the cable to run along the perimeter of the garden, how do I go about this? (Not me personally, I'm not going to touch this wire). And where can I get an idea of how much the ESB will charge for disconnecting, rerouting and reconnecting.


This weekend I do plan on making some investigative digs to see what I can find out, being very careful.

Instead of digging up the garden, you could hire a cable avoidance tool from most tool hire places. Most definatley it's a job for the esb.

thesavageye

hi colm , i used to work with the esb so id be able to say yes generally as the crow flies, usually a foot to 2 feet deep, the problem with a cable detector tool for the esb cables is that they sometimes dont pick up their cables becaus the neutral core is wound around the live core, which means it cancels out the magnetic field from the live core that the tool would be trying to pick up... the best thing/only thing really is to call them , id imagine ull be looking at a cost of 6-8 hundred euros all in , u will have to dig a new trench from box to pole, lay in the red electric ducting, insert a draw wire, and run ducting rite to the butt of the pole, the lads will disconnect old supply and pull in new one and connect it at the top of the pole.run ur ducting around your perimeter that way it will forever be out of the way of any further works. so call the esb asap or really ull be wasting more time and essentiall dodging landmines trying to work around that old buried cable.

Avns1s

I think its normally the house builder / developer that would put the duct in place and the ESB would then come and pull the cable through.

I agree that its probably close to a straight line from the pole to the box but thats not necessarily guaranteed.

I would also think that most responsible builders etc would have that cable duct in the region of 18"+ below the surface.

Now, if you go to change its route, you are into paying ESB and that ain't gonna be cheap. You will also have to dig a trench and put a duct and drawwire in place before the ESB will do their thing.

My question would be, how big is the garden and how much drainage trenching is required and to what depth. What I am really getting at is whether or not, it's an option to do the drainage by hand digging, in which case, there is little likelihood of doing any damage to that duct / cable, even if you do find it. Unless of course you go hell for leather with a pickaxe!