Can you have outdoor lights/electric fitted without inside walls being damaged?

[PureBlackVoid]

I will be getting someone qualified to quote for this obviously, but electrical work confuses me so I want to figure out what to ask for before I waste anyone’s time.

I want to have an outdoor plug socket and wall lights fitted in my garden (the socket is less important but while I’m doing one I may as well do both). I mentioned it to someone in passing ages ago, and they said the cables etc can come from an existing socket inside.

Would this mean inside walls will need to be chiselled all over the place to fit wires? I had 2 light sconces fitted inside once and the mess was worse than some of the bigger refurbs we’ve had done.

For garden lights, I’d prefer them to be switch operated, not sensor or dusk til dawn etc so I can just have them on in the evenings when I want to.

My living room and kitchen both back on to the garden - the living room has sockets on the wall that backs on to the garden if that makes it easier. What about the light switch that would be needed? Could they just cut out the square or whatever thats needed for it, and run the cables on the exterior of the wall instead of having them chiselled in inside?

I tried out some solar lights the last 2 summers to avoid the wiring, but they were shit so I don’t want to waste more money on them.

The socket can be drilled through the wall behind it. I would prefer to see a switched FCU indoors next to the socket, or at working height above it, fused at 13A so it can be isolated when it becomes faulty or rain gets in, or if a neighbour tries to steal your electricity. You might like one outside the front door for Christmas lights.

If you are taking it from a kitchen socket above the worktop, it may already be at a reasonable height. I think it would be better to use a separate switched FCU for the lights as it should be fused at 5A, and turned on and off separately from inside.

However, if you can take up the floor above, you could run the lights off the ground floor lighting circuit, which will put the outdoor lighting cables up high, not noticeable. You will still need a DP indoor switch, because outdoor lighting is a very common source of RCD trips when rain gets in.

If you have the walls chased out there will be some dust, and the chase will show until next redecoration, but it will be a better job. Some of the new chasing machines have vacuum dust extraction but it is not perfect.

Before sure use a qualified electrician who is a member of one of the Competent Person schemes. NICEIC is one example.

Thanks for the reply. When you say it can be drilled from the wall behind it, do you mean the cables could then run on the exterior of the wall? So if (say) a light switch was at normal height inside, but the lights were a bit further down the wall outside, the cable could go straight out and along the wall to the lights?

It is probably the least neatest option, but eventually we will have some sort of canopy/pergola type thing outside so the cables wouldn’t be that visible. I have thought about having the electric for this run from the bedroom above, as that room will need redoing at some point anyway but we would still need a light switch fitting downstairs somewhere (unless we want to go upstairs first every time we want to go into the garden in the evening..)

I really want to avoid having anything chased downstairs inside, not just cos of the mess but patching up/redecorating as well to keep costs down.

The socket will be just for a lawnmower, jet wash etc no xmas lights or anything (ie it will only be in use when we are home to use the thing that is plugged into it). I didn’t think of neighbours potentially stealing electric - it would be in the back garden, secure/high fences etc but still I’ll be looking at a lockable cover box thing.

Yes.

And

If you have an isolating switch inside the house, you can cut power to the external socket or lights.