Drilling into walls and Spanish electrics

[SMG]

[archiebake]

Hi smg,
A cable tester is the way to go, I forgot to take one out with me but I bought one at my local ferreteria.There are a few different expanding plugs on the market over here , ask a local electrician ,I have seen some that they use in plasterboard ceilings that are quite new.
Remember if you have an apartment the ceilings are reinforced with steel rods, when I was fitting light fixtures my tester was of no use,but the ceilings are thick,so you should be ok.
I hope that is some help. archiebake

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Thanks archiebake for a prompt reply. I am not having to touch the ceilings luckily, I have enough problem with the walls. I have not yet found anything in the hardware shops so may have to resort to seeking out a builder or electrician for advice.

[archiebake]

Hi,
My son tells me the new type of fixings are called dry line fixings.They look like a large plug with a a funny looking deep threaded screw.I think they would fit the bill.Have alook in your yellow pages and try looking for your nearest Electrical Factors.the electrical wires do tend to come down verticlal,but watch out for the square pannels that have been decorated over,these are junction boxes.Easy to get into if you need to wire something extra. Water pipes can run horizontal as well as vertical.
Hope it is of some help archiebake

I have found that the line of electric and water pipes tends to follow the whim of the fitter on the day. It would be nice to think that they are in straight lines but I have not found this. A good hint is to look inside the junction boxes (as mentioned previously) and then try and work out in which direction the pipes start to go.
As far as fixings go for the tile/bricks, you need to have some sort of fixing which grips on the back surface of the tile. These can be variously toggle fixings (where a metal piece drops down once inserted), a butterfly fixing (two sprung wings fly out the other side of the hole) or expansion fixings (where the body of the fixing expands when the screw is tightened). Most of the Ferreterias carry them. You are unlikely to have success with dry wall fixings as these rely on the action of biting into the plasterboard and the tile is too unyielding for this to be effective.

[SMG]

Thank you both for the replies. I shall look into the mains box to see direction of cables and also see if the Ferretaria knows what thos clips are.