Industrial
Power and distribution for sites that cannot lose supply
Lake Electrical is an industrial electrical contractor working across the South East, on main intake panels and distribution, submains and boards, supplies and connections for plant and machinery, high bay and warehouse lighting, and fixed wire testing on a live site. The work is planned around your production schedule, including nights, weekends and round the clock, and handed over certified and documented.
NICEIC approved contractor. SafeContractor accredited. DBS-checked engineers. Trading since 2008.
Industrial electrical contractor working across the South East
We are an electrical contractor based in East Sussex, working across Kent, East Sussex, Surrey and the wider South East. On the industrial side we work for site and production managers, maintenance and engineering managers, facilities managers on industrial estates, and the main contractors and consulting engineers on those sites. What they share is a building where the supply cannot be interrupted, because everything downstream is making something or moving something. Our other sectors sit under sectors, and everything we do is on services.
When the work is booked around the contractor instead of around production
The failure mode on an industrial site is electrical work scheduled around the contractor rather than around production. A shutdown booked for a Saturday that runs into Monday morning. A distribution board nobody can isolate without stopping a line, so the remedial keeps being deferred. An intake sized for the plant that was here twenty years ago, now carrying two more machines and a compressor. Protective devices that no longer discriminate, so a fault on one machine drops a whole floor. And no record of what feeds what, so every change starts with somebody tracing cables while the shift waits.
The alternative starts before anyone picks up a tool. The load and the discrimination are worked out first, so the design fits the plant as it runs now and a fault on one machine trips one device. The changeover is planned in stages, on a temporary supply or on generators, so the site keeps its power while the equipment behind it is replaced. The work is booked around production, including nights and weekends. And you get a schedule on handover that says what feeds what.
What that looks like on your site
A maintenance manager who can isolate a board on Tuesday afternoon and name every circuit that will go off before he does it. A line that ran through the weekend the switchgear feeding it was replaced.
Continuity of supply is the capability, and here is where it has been proved
Work on a building that cannot be switched off is the hardest version of this job, and it is the part we are strongest on. The clearest example we can publish is not an industrial one, and we would rather say so than let you assume otherwise. We swapped a £310k main intake panel at a university laboratory in Chichester over three days on backup generators, with no loss of power to the labs. That was a laboratory rather than a factory. What carries across is the method: the switching sequence worked out in advance, the generators sized and proved, and the load moved across in stages. Working around a live building is normal for us, and a production line asks the same thing of us that those labs did.
What we take on on an industrial site
The building work around the installation is subcontracted, and the electrical design and every connection is ours. Where a site needs PA, evacuation or AV, that is handled by our sister company, OBAV. General installation work sits on commercial electrical installations.
Accredited, insured and used to site rules
Lake Electrical is a NICEIC approved contractor and SafeContractor accredited, our engineers are DBS-checked, and installation and inspection work is carried out to BS 7671 and to building regulations. We are used to the paperwork a site asks for before a contractor is through the gate, the method statements, the risk assessments and the records at handover. Trading since 2008.
Recent work
What clients say
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Why clients choose the Lake Electrical team
Lake Electrical is family run and owner led, and the owners run the jobs themselves, so the person walking the site with you and agreeing the shutdown window is the one who prices it and answers for it. Call in working hours and you get a person in the office rather than a voicemail. Our engineers have all been with us at least two years, so the engineer who opens your panel next year is likely to be the one who labelled it this year. We will not be the cheapest quote you receive, and we are straight about that.
Industrial electrical questions answered
Whether you can work without stopping production
Usually, yes. The production schedule sets the programme rather than our diary. We work out what can be done live, what needs an isolation and how small that isolation can be made, then agree the windows before anything is booked.
Whether a changeover can be done on temporary or generator supply
Yes, and on larger equipment that is often the only sensible way to do it. The load can be moved across in stages, carried on a temporary supply, or run on generators sized and proved beforehand. We changed a main intake panel at a Chichester university laboratory over three days on backup generators, and the same method suits a site with a line running through it.
How often an industrial site needs fixed wire testing
More often than an office. Commercial premises are generally inspected every five years, while industrial installations are commonly recommended at three, and heavy plant, vibration, dust or wash-down can warrant sampling in between. We agree the interval and the extent in writing before we start.
How the work is priced, and whether a visit comes first
A visit comes first on anything involving the intake, the switchgear or a shutdown, because the existing arrangement decides what is possible. We price the full job to building regulations, with any remedial work listed on its own. On smaller work a few details is enough for a price, usually the same day.
Whether you work nights and weekends
Yes. A lot of our work is done in the evenings, at weekends or round the clock, because the site cannot always stop for us. Out of hours working is priced into the quote at the start.
Whether you take on machine and plant wiring
We take on the supply and the connection. That means the submain, the local distribution, the isolator, the final connection and the controls wiring that belongs to the supply, tested and certified. The machine itself, and process and control engineering, sit with the machine builder or your own engineering team. [[CONFIRM: how far into machine, panel and control wiring you want to go, so this answer can be widened or left as supply and final connection]]
Request a quote for work on a live site
If you are planning an intake upgrade, a board change, a lighting scheme or an inspection on a site that cannot lose supply, the next step is a look at the building.
Planning work on a live site? Request a quote. Prefer a chat first? Get in touch, or call the team on [[NAP: phone number]], Mon to Fri, 8am to 5pm.
We work across Kent, East Sussex, Surrey and the wider South East, with commercial work reaching sites such as Chichester.