The Brew Cabin

Posted: **Thu Mar 10, 2016 11:46 am**

I'm looking to build an oak framed garage next to my house. I need to submit planning for it fairly sharpish so i need to confirm where it will be sited.
If i put it in the ideal position, both the mains water pipe and mains electric cable will be underneath it.
If i use strip footings, the cable/pipes will pass through these. Is that allowed/advisable?
Or, if i use a raft footing, i will not need to dig down as far as the pipe/cable, but they would still be under the structure and a pain to get to should anything go wrong with them.
Or, i should just suck it up and re-route the services or move the gagage a bit further back to the point where the services aren't an issue?

Any thoughts?

Posted: **Thu Mar 10, 2016 2:38 pm**

If they are already feeding your property they should be in a duct with the mains leccy coming up in an 'hockey stick' to the meter? the water should be in a blue duct. you will need to box out both sides of the srevices and a lintel placed over them a few courses above, or place a larger duct around each one before concreting to allow movement if they ever need replacing.

Posted: **Thu Mar 10, 2016 4:58 pm**

There is also a chance they wont be in a duct more than likely beside each other.
Depth wise water should be 750mm deep and electric around 500mm but in reality could be any depth. If you find you water pipe is lead you amy as well replace it if its in budget I replaced a water feed pipe a couple of weeks ago that was 15mm copper whoever had replaced the lead pipe previously should have used plastic was amazed that it had lasted owever many years it was in the ground.

Posted: **Thu Mar 10, 2016 8:23 pm**

From my experience in South cheshire I have never seen a water pipe in a duct and electric rarely in a duct but I am rural .put the build where you want, building regs around here wouldn't bother about it.

Posted: **Tue Mar 15, 2016 10:35 am**

Thanks for the replies. I am in a similar position to Digerjones (rural) and I can confirm that water pipe is not ducted (it is simply a blue MDPE pipe) and the electric cable isn't ducted either (just an inch or so thick black cable that come from the pole in a field).

I'll guess i'lll go ahead an put in planning to have the garage where i want it, and just take advice from the BCO as to how to deal with the pipe/cable if/when the time comes.

The Brew Cabin

Building over services - Options?