Friday, a quick job,not

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phil d

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Went to swap a couple of socket fronts for a mate, earth loop of 23 ohms,dno called and chaos broke out, so much for a quick favour. They were still there at half nine last night. 

 
Went to swap a couple of socket fronts for a mate, earth loop of 23 ohms,dno called and chaos broke out, so much for a quick favour. They were still there at half nine last night. 


Its ALL your fault, you broke it, it was alright before you put your tester on it. When will you learn!

Doc H.

 
Update. it was a TNS system, should have mentioned that earlier, but have been mad busy. Anyway I got the 23 ohms loop reading so decided to do a Ze , this came in the same, now I was using a new meter and just wondered if it could be faulty as they'd recently had a new meter and tails fitted. I rang a mate of mine who happened to be passing and rather than drive home to collect my other meter he said he'd swing by with his. His meter does P-N, P-E and N-E, it turned out the high reading was N-E, we rang the DNO and they sent a man out, he tested and then the digging teams arrived, I had left by this point but at 9.15 that night I received a text from the mate, apparently there were loads of men and they were doing a lot of digging.

On the Saturday morning I received a text again, apparently there was quite a big fault and the engineer from the DNO said that most electricians would not have found it, let alone reported it!, it shows how many people will do a small job and not carry out any testing. They were concerned about the safety issues it could have caused and are going to be looking into how the meter fitter didn't detect any problems, apparently it was a major corrosion issue on a cable and should have been picked up on.

Anyway the customer had an MEM board with 3036's in it and no RCD protection, I was going to mention that he may wish to consider an upgrade, when I went back on Monday, to connect a cooker. Well the DNO bloke has advised them to have it upgraded and suggested that they should ask me to do it as," the bloke who found this fault obviously knows his job, and you can trust him to do a decent job". There's obviously no better recommendation than that, anyway I'm going to check everything tomorrow and hopefully fit a board with RCBO's, it's only a small house, 1 ring final, 2 lighting circuits and a cooker circuit, so for the cost and convenience I'm going to go RCBO rather than RCD.

All in all a nice little day, the customer is my mate's sister and her husband, he's doing some jobs for them and asked me to do the socket swaps, so now I've a new customer and a recommendation from the guy at the DNO, not bad really. 

 
I had a similar job over Christmas, couple of other electricians had been out and done variations of nothing/swapped a couple of 3036's for MCB's (how does that stop the power going off for no reason). I turned up, found a high loop and noticed a loose cable on the cutout end of the neutral which had obviously been arcing for some time. Had Western Power out immediately and had a new cutout fitted. I can only assume I was the first person there to actually test anything.

 
I had a similar job over Christmas, couple of other electricians had been out and done variations of nothing/swapped a couple of 3036's for MCB's (how does that stop the power going off for no reason). I turned up, found a high loop and noticed a loose cable on the cutout end of the neutral which had obviously been arcing for some time. Had Western Power out immediately and had a new cutout fitted. I can only assume I was the first person there to actually test anything.
Went back this morning to connect the cooker and the guy was telling me about the first engineer who came out, apparently he told the homeowner that it was his wiring that was knackered, he had no business having a 3036, board, apparently their illegal! The DNO had no obligation to supply an earth, (there was one there originally) I was in the wrong for leaving the power on, and if they expected him to leave the power on they'd have to sign a disclaimer!

Another engineer arrived on scene and said that the problem was indeed down to them, he said that while the 3036 board wasn't ideal it was NOT illegal, although he did advise having it changed. he disagreed about not being not responsible for the earth, and said that the meter fitter should have at very least reported the cast iron head, they have a policy of replacing them. Anyway it seems the first guy was well known as a pita, and nobody liked him.

Still all's well that ends well. 

 
Part of this is down to the power companies not explaining their policies though. I did a rewire the other week, noticed a cast iron head and had Northern Power out to replace it (partly because the earth was just a 2.5 solid wrapped around one the cable clamp screws). Loop was still good (.0 something on a TNS) but still, nice to have it at least looking half decent when you've done. I know for a fact no-one else round here would have bothered, but then I did a job the other year and there was a similar arrangement so I left it with the homeowner to arrange a new cutout and they didn't want to know. I think that was even worse as there was a 951 clamp around the lead that I didn't touch, just left an earth block expecting there to be a new cutout fitted.

 
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I've spent my working life going to jobs that have obviously had plenty of additional work carried out at different times ,  usually showers , kitchen alterations , extra sockets ....   plenty of visits from other Sparks......but I'm the only one to see   (a) the manky coppper clip on the TNs lead sheath or the 951 (b) The perished meter tails. (c)  The high Ze  (d)  The Ze depending upon the lead water pipe  (e)  The total lack of bonding  .

 
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