How easy to be led astray .

How easy for the mind to be diverted when all is going well .

Try to put you in the picture without rambling on ,   my neighbour's kitchen lights keep tripping the MCB  ....can I have a look .     

2 gang switch  with 6  downlights   & 9 downlights ............9 downlights are tripping after around 1 minute...been working for years.               Looked last week ,  thinking it'll be a melted GU10 lampholder flex .........no  it was the T/E  switchwire & N with a L to E fault  ..under the bathroom floor  , all tiled , no access , can't get to it .

I  disconnected lights ,  tested  the 9  lights loop all  good , my only solution was to return today ..& feed lights from the other end....  fish cable from last light , down behind cupboard to a 3A spur  feed it from cupboard lights  spur ..fed from ringmain.     How can it go wrong ?  

I was reconnecting a downlight  at the other end ,  whoever did them  made it hard to get the cover on so I re-do it  , from L- N-E     to  L-E -N   ...just need to move one of the lampholder wires across............someone at the door  calling  ...looking for someone down the road ...sort him out , put the light back  in the ceiling .     I now have the lamp across L - E   but am happily plodding on ......... switch on ...RCD trips now  'cos I'm on the ring main.......but why !!...I know these 9 lights are clear , its just a  radial ,    I know !!...I must have re- connected the faulty sw/wire  instead of the loop at the other end . No its correct.    Still  tripping !    I now have a  L - E  fault  ...wheres that come from ?  , I tested it all , it was fine ,   how can this happen to me ,  I'm Evans Electric FFS ,  I'm supposed to  be a professional  .....the lights should come on ...... they cannot fail to come on ....because I ...the Great Deke.... The one time  Spark of the Year ....has proved the circuit  to be OK ...  ......has done this  a million times.......      

I break the  radial loop in the centre  and re-test   .... those 5 are now clear , these 4 have a fault .......and then the penny drops ,   I was  called to the door ,   memory span of a demented bluebottle ...Oh look I left that fitting hanging out  .......Oh look , I created an L -E fault   then spent 1/2 hour  trying to find it !!!! :C     Oh well , keep it to yourself  or  other Forumites will be pointing & sniggering . ....yes best say nothing .   

wish i could say ive never done something similar...

We have ALL been there!

Like when I first started using WAGOs. Had a thought...that stuck, that they could replace connector blocks FOREVER. I'd found a broken & burnt batten holder in a loft so stuck a 222 on the end of the 1mm intending to get another holder...and forgot about it.

Dead tests were a WTGrape moment. Just didn't compute that WAGOs are straight thru and not separate terminals.

:Blushing

My bit of pure genious was forgetting to crimp the lugs on a 400A feed to a new switchboard. The plant was starting up when the penny dropped and i had to think of an excuse to shuting every down again.

what was the excuse?

It was 20 plus Yeats ago.

Der management didn't swallow my excuse but had to accept as they didn't know the details.

I kept on getting work sheets with "make sure the connections are tight" at the bottom" someone had spilt the beans.

Onoff said:

Like when I first started using WAGOs. Had a thought...that stuck, that they could replace connector blocks FOREVER. I'd found a broken & burnt batten holder in a loft so stuck a 222 on the end of the 1mm intending to get another holder...and forgot about it.

Dead tests were a WTGrape moment. Just didn't compute that WAGOs are straight thru and not separate terminals.

:Blushing

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Me too  :coat   answering the phone midway through the task was my issue

Oh yes, we've all been there, I've had some classics in my time, take last week for example.

Doing a favour for a mate, needed to run a 3&e through a plastic conduit (long story) anyway spent 30 minutes getting it in, came to connect the ends, " hello why is there a blue core in here",  then the penny dropped!

He'd bought a 50 mtr drum of 3 core, "you keep whats left over" says he, in the car I have a part roll, so I use that instead. I pick the end of the cable up to attach to the fish, someone offers me a smoke, I drop the cable, have the cig, then carry on. Only trouble is I pick up the 2 core t&e that's lying alongside it, doh!

Spurring a socket off a ring, chase out wall, fit box, lift boards, run cable, connect socket front, take phone call, refit boards, power up, test,no power, then see the jb lying in the top of toolbox!

Recently did a cracker, fitted some new lights on a renovation job, customer forgets to get lamps, I fit new fittings and go home, a week later I get a call from client, "the lights are behaving oddly". I'd only gone and got a switchwire (unmarked) in the wrong terminal on one of the fittings. That one was down to said client trying to get me to do a dozen things at once, and yapping at me as I'm trying to work.

You all sound incompetent, I never do things like this. :innocent

I don't stop for a brew when doing things like that, too easy to get distracted.

I have never ever never driven home from a job and forgotten to move the sliders across in a Merlin gerin board ever

likewise I have never loose fitted the MCCBs in a 1600A Merlin Gerin panel board so I can level up all the breakers and forgotten to tighten the shear bolts, ever

:innocent

i use a LOT of Merlin Gerin /Schneider boards

i never did once travel 50 miles to a job in the middle of nowhere at 11pm on a friday night and fleave my toolbag in the house

one of my dads (not electrical). pull lines, pull pin, get distracted, drive forward and drop tailer...

I've spent the last few years living between 2 houses, 150 miles apart. Remembering to take house keys with you when you leave is a challenge once you have spent several days/weeks somewhere else.

When I was an apprentice I used to get to work on a Monday morning, open the boot of my car and then think "hmm, wonder where my toolbox is...." Sometimes it was at home sometimes it was in someone else's van, sometimes it was at someone else's house.

Not my fault, funny but annoying.

Many years ago when I was with my ex, I was doing a job in North Wales, about a hundred miles from my home in St Helens. I needed a very small part, was unable to get one locally, so had to return the following day.

I knew I had said part at home so immediately I got home I located it and placed it on fireplace with my van keys, it won't get forgotten in morning, then went for a pint in my local.

The following morning I got up, picked up keys and drove to the job, on getting there I realised I had not got the part! I eventually located one a good distance away, finished job and went home, I was raving, how could I have forgotten it, it was with the keys. I looked on fireplace, nothing there, "oh that little thing" said my ex, when I asked her about it, "I put it away safe last night, it looked important and I didn't want you to lose it"

 WOMEN!

Haha - several times I've sold something on ebay, wrapped it up and booked a collection from a courier and dutifully left the parcel in my porch ready for collection whilst I've gone off to work, then returned home to find the parcel sat in my office, because my now ex partner has helpfully brought my delivery in off the front porch.

Odd thing is, whenever there was real deliveries ( 3 or 4 times  week) she'd never bring them in, only when it was actually collections. How I laughed.

:C

I find that the older I get , the more I need to take "Not forgetting " actions .  

  Like COUNT the MCBs in a new board  then count them off as tightened . 

Certain things  I now need to put in the same place ........so all house & vehicle keys on hooks in the hall  ...if they're not there I'm lost ..... car keys ???  In the coat I wore yesterday ...in those jeans in the wash basket .... in wife's handbag....bedside table .... last time I lost them they were in the car ignition , been there for two days . 

Ducky !!.......what the hell IS that colourful image ? 

keys are always in my pocket, including any customer keys after the door slammed behind me one day when I nipped out to the van....

Evans Electric said:

Ducky !!.......what the hell IS that colourful image ? 

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led ashtray? I also misread the thread title as that! Lol!