Installing an Extractor Fan

Yesterday afternoon, I spent on my hands and knees up in the loft trying to install an extractor fan for the bathroom. It actually wasn't too difficult a job, it was just time consuming as whichever tool I needed in the loft was in the bathroom, or conservatory, or the sitting room, or had been stolen by the tool fairies.

First of all I marked out the spot on the ceiling where the centre of the extractor fan should go. I checked from the loft that this was clear of any joists etc. and cleared back the old blown-insulation away from the prospective hole, so as not to be covered in it once the hole drill had sawn through. I did this simply by drilling a smallish hole in the centre and poking a biro through it so it was visible from both sides.

Next up checked the hole saw against the size of the extractor fan only to find that my hole saw fits neatly inside... meaning it's about 5mm too thin (from a radius point of view).

With dustsheet in bath and lotions and potions cleared off the side, let the drilling commence! Oh and let the plaster dust cover everything, including me. A few seconds later the core from the plastered ceiling pops out with a clean circle left above me.

I broke through the wooden slats after a few tries, as they tend to spring away from the drill, but once through I could stare in awe much like a channel tunnel engineer (although obviously on a smaller scale).

As the hole wasn't quite large enough, I then cut around the edges using a plasterboard knife, using it more like a file just to shave away the edges giving me that few extra millimetres. A bit wider on two 'sides' allowing for the fixings to poke through and a quick wiggle and push and the extractor fan was in (the downlight and extractor opening).

Next up I secured the fixing screws which hold the unit in place in the ceiling opening and went back up into the loft to wire the electrics up. We already had a pull switch in the bathroom for the previous electric shower which we had removed, so it was a case of taking this switch live and neutral feed and splitting in parallel to the downlight transformer and the fan unit.

Once all the connections were made and tested, I attached the flexible ventilation hose from the ceiling unit to the fan unit and secured it in place using the cable ties provided.

The final job still sitting on the to-do list for the extractor fan job is to get the ventilation to the outside... but we'll save that for another day