Thanks paul!
This is pretty much the standard small installation for a small house circa 1985 ish. It replaced a 1930's installation. The 32A MCB went in when an electric cooker was installed a few years later.
The panel is mounted ontop of a frame to give more wiring space behind it, those cables coming out the bottom/top arn't punched through the plastic casing, they're coming out of specific gaps in the frame behind the panel
Originally there would have been a plastic cover strip at the top covering up those cables, however, a second-rate cooker installer has had a go at this panel and the consumer decided to give the cables a nice coat of pink paint! !
Thesedays all the cables coming out the top would need to go through conduit to meet codes. The thin cables coming out of the bottom actually go to a bell transformer & another big diazed fuse unit carrying a low rated fuse to protect it!
Not a particularly neat installation but pretty typical! It's covered by a louver door so it's not too ugly
The thicker pair of cables, which although fully double sheathed should if only for the sake of being neat and tidy be in conduit! are going to a feed for the shower sub-panel.
Way too much messing around by multitasking plumbers!! At least the shower's connected via a pre-assembled Fuse+RCB unit and with the correct size cables albeit without any thought for neatness.
[This message has been edited by djk (edited 09-14-2003).]