Switchboard upgrades and rewires of the board
Ceramic fuses and no RCDs mean a board built for a house with one television. Replaced in a day, certified, with room left for what comes next.
Booked in, usually within the week
This is the page if any of these is happening
- Ceramic fuses with fuse wire, or a board with no test buttons on it at all
- Breakers tripping whenever two big appliances run together
- No room left on the board to add a circuit for an aircon or a charger
- A board that is scorched, rusted, or has a door that no longer closes
- A building inspection or a settlement that flagged the board
Replacing the board, not patching it
Most homes in Duncraig, Padbury, Woodvale and Greenwood were wired for a house with one television, one fridge and no air conditioning. Ceramic fuses do not detect a person touching a live wire — they only ever protected the cable. A modern board protects the people in the house as well.
An upgrade means a new enclosure, a main switch, a proper earth and neutral arrangement, circuit breakers sized to the cable actually installed, and RCDs covering every final subcircuit. We test every existing circuit first, because a board upgrade occasionally uncovers an older fault that was hiding behind an under-rated fuse.
We size the new board with genuine spare ways. Adding a car charger, a heat pump or a second aircon in two years should not mean paying for a board a second time.
What is included
- Pre-upgrade testing
- Insulation resistance and earth continuity on every existing circuit, so nothing nasty is discovered halfway through with the power off.
- New enclosure and main switch
- Weather-rated where the board is outside, with a door that latches and a legible circuit schedule inside it.
- RCBOs on every circuit
- One combined safety switch and breaker per circuit, so a fault in the kitchen no longer takes the lights out with it.
- Main earth and bonding
- Earth stake, main earth conductor and water-pipe bonding brought up to current standards. Often the part that was never right.
- Spare capacity
- A minimum of four spare ways left free, sized so the next addition is a half-hour job rather than another upgrade.
- Certificate and schedule
- Electrical Safety Certificate lodged, plus a labelled schedule photographed and emailed to you.
What a switchboard upgrade costs
Board work is quoted as one fixed price after we have looked at what is there. These bands cover the great majority of northern-suburbs homes.
- Standard domestic board, 6–10 circuits
- $1,450 – $2,100Ceramic fuses out, new enclosure, RCBOs throughout, earth upgrade included.
- Larger home, 12–18 circuits
- $2,100 – $3,200Bigger enclosure, more RCBOs, usually a two-row board with generous spare ways.
- Board relocation
- +$600 – $1,400Moving the board from a hallway cupboard to an external wall, including the new main run.
- Consumer mains upgrade
- +$900 – $2,400Only where the supply cable itself is undersized. We tell you at quote time, not on the day.
One day on site for a standard board, with the power off for roughly four to six hours of it. We give you the window the day before so you can plan around it.
On the day
- 01Power is off for most of the day. Charge phones and laptops overnight and move anything critical out of the freezer if you have a second one.
- 02If you work from home, plan to work somewhere else that day or tell us and we will stage it to keep one circuit alive as long as possible.
- 03Clear a metre of space in front of the board, inside and out.
- 04If you have solar, we need the inverter accessible too — it has to be isolated and brought back up correctly.
The same job, written up with the clock attached
5 out of 5
Rang at nine on a Sunday night expecting a message bank and got an actual electrician. He talked me through turning the right breaker off over the phone so we could sleep, then turned up first thing Monday. Ended up replacing the whole board, and the price he said on Monday morning was the price on the invoice.
Mark D.Joondalup · March 2026Read the job this refers to
What people ask about switchboard upgrades
Do I legally have to upgrade my switchboard?
Not on its own. What Western Australian law does require is at least two RCDs protecting all power point and lighting circuits before a home is sold or rented out. On an old ceramic fuse board there is usually nowhere to fit them properly, which is what turns a legal requirement into a board upgrade.
Can you do it without turning the power off?
No, and anyone who says otherwise is not doing it properly. The supply has to be isolated to rebuild the board. We keep the outage as short as we can and tell you the window the day before.
What if you find something wrong once the board is open?
We test every circuit before we quote precisely so that this does not happen. If something is genuinely hidden — perished insulation on a cable inside a wall, for example — we stop, show you, and quote that separately. It never gets added to the invoice without you agreeing first.
Will a new board stop my breakers tripping?
If the tripping was caused by an under-rated fuse or a shared circuit, yes. If there is a genuine fault on a circuit, a new board will find it faster and more accurately than the old one did. We test as part of the upgrade, so you will know which it was.
Booked in, usually within the week
Ring it through and we will tell you which band it falls in.
We text when we are on the way, and you get the price before we start.
7:00am – 7:00pm, seven days · EC 13927
Often the next question
- 03
Safety switches & testing
The only device in the house that protects a person rather than a cable. Fitted, tested and documented for owners, landlords and agencies.
- 05
Power points & rewires
Extra points where you actually need them, new circuits for the heavy stuff, and full rewires when the old cable has run out of life.