Background
The scooter needs to be recharged and preferably permanently connected to the charger to keep the batteries in good condition. Electrics needed to be installed in the scooter port. This would allow the scooter to be recharged without having to lay out a cable from the house each time. This will also give the added benefit of providing an electric point in the garden for lawnmowers, strimmers and other power tools when required. As well as power points the electrics will also provide basic lighting with an on/off switch. All of the electrical equipment will be specifically designed for outdoor use.
The cable from the house out to the scooter port was buried in a trench across the lawn and the flower bed.
The trench was dug and 20mm diameter corrugated conduit laid in it with the mains cable already installed within the conduit.
A hole was drilled in the base board of the scooter port to bring the conduit out of the trench and into the port.
The wire was fed through an underfloor vent then through a holed drilled into the floor and connected into the house electrics.
The dual gang switched waterproof socket unit was temporarily mounted on one of the scooter port posts to allow the wiring to be installed.
A box will be constructed which will house the switched unit and the battery charger for the scooter batteries.
Here the switched unit has been connected up to the house electrics and the neon lights can be seen through the translucent cover.
The connection into the house electrics has been protected with a 7 Amp fuse giving an available output of approximately 1600 Watts. The external sockets will also allow garden tools to be used without having to feed out an extension cable.
Although there is no intention to use the scooter significantly in the dark, a bulkhead lamp unit was installed on the roof cross beam to provide light to allow safe entry and exit to and from the scooter and to allow any maintenance work to be performed in the evenings if it is ever required.
There is no internal lighting in the scooter so this lamp will also allow the charger plug to be connected easily in the darker evenings.
An external waterproof switch was installed to allow the bulkhead light to be switched on and off. Until the wooden housing is installed the light is run from one of the 13 Amp sockets. It will later be wired into the main supply freeing up one of the sockets for other uses, e.g. vacuum cleaner or lawn mower.
The switch has a built in red light. It can be wired as an on off indicator, location indicator or permanently on.
I chose to wire it as a location indicator, i.e. it allows someone to locate the switch in the dark.
More information to follow soon.....