Electric shock from light switch

[pargyle]

Part P of the building regs was a Prescott jobs for his sparky pals wheeze. It meant loads of paper work for any changes to house wiring and a very expensive training course... After April 2013 Part P only really means anything if you are messing with the consumer unit. ( all caveats and exemptions apply ... electrocution or setting fire to house your problem)

Well ... that's a bit of a simplification .. there are still a number of items that are 'notifiable' but can be self certified by a 'competent person'. It's a lot better than when Part P was in it's former state but anyone wanting to be certain of what you can and can't do (not what you could and would do !) needs to read up on the current Part P Amendment.

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/uploads/br/BR_PDF_AD_P_2013.pdf

The rule of thumb in my book is either get a qualified electrician to do the work, do it yourself if you are confident of your electrical ability and be prepared to get a 'competent person' to inspect, test and certify the work - or ignore the former two and make sure your buildings/contents and/or life assurance are up to date !

 

[roche]

Thanks for the link Pargyle, and the info DerekM - it looks unusually like an outbreak of common sense!

 

[drstitson]

The reason why italian plug pins are of different sizes is that they used to have independent supplies for lights and sockets (10A & 16A) with separate fuse boxes/consumer units/meters.
last of these set-ups were phased out in Lazio <20 years ago; but the convention remains for 10A & 16A (unfused) plugs.

 

[victor meldrew]

Our power outlets have seen some changes in my time ,ranging from 2amp twin outlets part and parcel of lighting switches through to 5 amp round pin sockets , 15 amp round pin sockets , 13 amp staggered flat pin plus central round pin earth to various local authority properties having their own standards requiring tenants to purchase their plug tops from the town hall!
For a long time these sockets were all in circulation at the time .
The trend for a long time now is harmonisation and none too soon in my opinion.
A friend of mine ,a plumber lost his life in a heart beat at the ripe old age of 26 years.
He had the full set in his tool bag and swapped when necessary, he made a clumsy attempt whilst rushed ,as so often happens he didn't get a second chance.
VM


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[Arfermo]

Get a sparky to investigate indeed but don't assume rcds are a panacea. Any mechanical device can malfunction at the worst possible time.

As I found out when I lifted some flooring in my place when I moved here 7 years ago, sparkies aren't to be trusted either. Found 3 cables chopped off but still live!!! Linked them into ring circuits myself. same with wretched plumbers. New HW tank - insulation left inside clogging up taps in kitchen and bath and 2 leaks from slack tightening of connectors to taps. So called professionals. Don't make me laugh!!!

 

[user 6228]

Well ... that's a bit of a simplification .. there are still a number of items that are 'notifiable' but can be self certified by a 'competent person'. It's a lot better than when Part P was in it's former state but anyone wanting to be certain of what you can and can't do (not what you could and would do !) needs to read up on the current Part P Amendment.

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/uploads/br/BR_PDF_AD_P_2013.pdf

The rule of thumb in my book is either get a qualified electrician to do the work, do it yourself if you are confident of your electrical ability and be prepared to get a 'competent person' to inspect, test and certify the work - or ignore the former two and make sure your buildings/contents and/or life assurance are up to date !

Qualified Electrician? after seeing their prowess in the domestic market, it needs wild horses for me to contemplate letting one of them over the threshold in their proffessional capacity.

 

[pargyle]

Qualified Electrician? after seeing their prowess in the domestic market, it needs wild horses for me to contemplate letting one of them over the threshold in their proffessional capacity.

Yes ... I can only agree with that ... Having done my 17th Edition course alongside some 'qualified' electricians who failed to pass the exam at the end (and I wasn't in the least bit surprised) I can see that there are some that you would not let anywhere near your electrics. But the reality is that the average person is not capable of even wiring a three pin plug properly let alone doing something like extending a ring main or adding a spur to a domestic ring - what alternative do they have ? The only caveat I would add is probably find a 'professional electrician' who has some recommendations or referrals from a known source behind them ... and even then it's a lottery. Plumbers/heating engineers ... even worse at times !!

 

[oliver90owner]

Yes, there was common sense and part p. Not really connected. They had hoped that common sense was completely dead and assumed everyone was a numpty.

Agreed, most are, but there are still a few exceptions for the basic considerations of live, neutral and earth. I buy any old rolls of suitably coded wire so I can claim the circuit was there umpteen years ago, before part p even came into being

RAB

 

[pargyle]

Yes, there was common sense and part p. Not really connected. They had hoped that common sense was completely dead and assumed everyone was a numpty.

Agreed, most are, but there are still a few exceptions for the basic considerations of live, neutral and earth. I buy any old rolls of suitably coded wire so I can claim the circuit was there umpteen years ago, before part p even came into being

RAB

Hmmmm.... well I'm not going to admit publicly to that particular subterfuge but I've now run out of my stock of old style cable (of course I didn't use it for any wiring purposes !). I see that reels of old style cable are now fetching high prices on ebay ... far in excess of their original cost ! Missed a trick there again ... story of my life !!

 

[victor meldrew]

As a retired sparky I am often asked if I have any 1 mil and 2.5 mil black ,red and bare earth .
Try working in industry ,where American machines have white coded earth and German machines
Red of all things . You quickly learn to trust nowt and check everything . I in the distant past have been caught out by back feeds from 3 phase circuitry with neutral fusing ,thankfully a thing of the past !
VM


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[REDWOOD]

EU regulations, what a laugh, have you seen the state of the wiring in Spanish hotels, I was cringing when an electrician fixed my balcony light with a bit of insulation tape wrapped around two twisted together bare wires.

Before I can do any work on electrical vehicles I have to completely deplete the batteries of their charge, even to change a pollen filter.

Why is the negative on a car brown and the live in domestic wiring brown, so many people have blown their very expensive ECUs and modules boost starting their vehicles with the wrong polarity, they should never have changed red and black

 

[oliver90owner]

Red and black were discarded because there are approx 8% who are colour blind and could be 'fooled' by that colour combination. Brown, blue and earth are easier for us. Unfortunately high voltage A/C and car wiring are not considered as an entity. Until EVs came along, the automobile and grid were completely divorced from one another. Might take another 50 years to reconcile the two! Numpties rule, OK.

RAB

 

[Dishmop]

Council wanted to rip my kitchen ceiling out to put new wiring in. I asked why new wiring? They said its for the new switches and sockets. Why do I need new switches and sockets? Because the new regulations say that all switches and sockets have to be at a certain height.
Are you building me a new house? No. So what new regulations say that you have to replace all switches and sockets in council houses? The new regulations. You mean the regulations applying to new buildings? Yes. But this house isnt new. We know that but because of the new regulations it has to have new switches and sockets. In the end I put the phone down. he called me back and asked why I had put the phone down.... because I have another dickhead knocking at the door.

 

[victor meldrew]

Red and black were discarded because there are approx 8% who are colour blind and could be 'fooled' by that colour combination. Brown, blue and earth are easier for us. Unfortunately high voltage A/C and car wiring are not considered as an entity. Until EVs came along, the automobile and grid were completely divorced from one another. Might take another 50 years to reconcile the two! Numpties rule, OK.

RAB

Maybe why avionics personnel in the RAF mustn't be colour defective !
Horses for courses.
Not many steeple jacks employed who fear heights I suspect .
Red for danger. Black for neutral, was the original concept!
Got to be more confusion wrought by messing about with colour coding and by a greater number of people than 8% .
We still have large parts of the supply infra structure wired in VIR ! lead clad cable . I pulled a guy from the supply authority about the use of this cable to link my house to next door . It was positioned at the right height to be leant on by the window cleaners aluminium ladder!
Sorry , was his reply ,there are hundreds of thousands of miles of this cable all round the UK.
This cable was made obsolete 50 years ago .
What a hotchpotch we have, more of the same isn't required, Shirley ?
Incidentally the most common colour defectiveness is red green , good job the traffic lights are stacked in a standard way to give a clue to colour defective drivers
Vm



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[jenkinsbrynmair]

Incidentally the most common colour defectiveness is red green , good job the traffic lights are stacked in a standard way to give a clue to colour defective drivers
Vm

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Hmm red for port green for starboard - which is why, even after passing the old harakiri colour charts test with ease I was sent off to undertake a 'lantern test' with the board of trade - a really testing routine which left no doubt as to me being able to distinguish between red and green.

 

[user 6228]

Yes ... I can only agree with that ... Having done my 17th Edition course alongside some 'qualified' electricians who failed to pass the exam at the end (and I wasn't in the least bit surprised) I can see that there are some that you would not let anywhere near your electrics. But the reality is that the average person is not capable of even wiring a three pin plug properly let alone doing something like extending a ring main or adding a spur to a domestic ring - what alternative do they have ? The only caveat I would add is probably find a 'professional electrician' who has some recommendations or referrals from a known source behind them ... and even then it's a lottery. Plumbers/heating engineers ... even worse at times !!

We are talking ladybird book of magnets and electricity here (I do have copy) ... how you can get out of primary school without a basic knowledge of electric circuits is bewildering

 

[Fraise]

The color codes are logical to anyone who wants to electrocute themselves:

Living plants, grass & flowers are green and yellow so = L for live
Garden Earth is brown colored so Brown = E for Earth
That leaves the blue wire which must go in the other (N) hole.

***** DO NOT USE THIS TO CONNECT A PLUG ******

How could anyone devise such a stupid system when we had sensible red for danger (live) coding in the good old (pre EC) days?

In all PME installations the neutral and earth lines are bonded together at the meter so getting the live wire correct is the most critical.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

We are talking ladybird book of magnets and electricity here (I do have copy) ... how you can get out of primary school without a basic knowledge of electric circuits is bewildering

I rewired our garage, stables and my canary shed when I was 13 - all three a reasonable distance from the house and the only 'help' I got was that there was already a dedicated fuse box inside the back door for me to link them up to

 

[REDWOOD]

Red for stop green for go, how black and white is that: