OMG my whole wall is electrified!?!

[ACurlyWurly]

So.... the stud wall between kitchen and dining room is coming down and electric points are moving. I have run a meter over the wall to find studs which also looks for wires and it's going off like a siren! The whole wall appears to have a spiders web of wires in it. I have tested the meter on other walls and it only show wires where you would expect them. Now I have a week until the sparky comes and am suddenly worries that the whole thing is a mess

Are these meters accurate on thin walls or could it be coils of wires?
Wall is only 2 inches thick.

Any words of wisdom?

Also the meter beeps differently for wood struts and wires could it be that the plasterboard has a mesh behind it which it thinks is wires or is it possible that it's all live wires back there. Wall starts coming down at the weekend. We are DIY but don't want to screw up!

We had this. Husband decided it was probably a glitch & put the shelves up anyway. He is still alive. DISCLAIMER I'm not recommending this approach!

To comply with wiring regs they should go horizontally or vertically from visible accessories either side of the wall. They are also allowed within 150mm of the ceiling or the angle between any two walls.

Scissor that's so funny. I'm hoping it's a glitch too and that those refs match up haha

Our wires run diagonally on one wall. It's the house that Jack built. Every job has professionals asking "who did this?"

It could be metal studwork rather than timber.

I'm starting to think it could be some sort of backing on the plaster. I will find out on Saturday when I make the first tentative incision.

So it turns out that my wall is a pre fab internal wall made from plaster board with cardboard honeycomb in it. It's coming apart one inch at a time so slow going but I'm getting most of one side before the sparky comes on Monday. No wonder the meter doesn't work on this wall