Dodgy trade pictures for your amusement! - 1 Million Views!

[lozarus]

Promised I'd replace the neighbours PIR light outside their garage. One look at the quality of the installation in there (Pic 1) told me what he soon confimed "yeah, a young lad I used to know from the pub did it for me a few years ago. I think he was training". Hmm. Anyway it was on a B32, extended from an existing house RFC- continuity of which was surprisingly still there. However, it goes to show the importance of visual. Pic 2 is a floating JB that I just had to open - straight off the 2.5mm RFC, unfused twin live 1.0mm (amazing that whoever did this had twin brown!) as a switch drop, then returned to a 5ft florry with the neutral via ths JB. This had nothing to do with the outside light - I found that in Pic 3 - more of that twin brown (with some blue masking tape to loosely inicate the neutral) unfused off the back of the socket below.

Anyway, 5 minute job takes me a good few hours. JB removed and replaced with 5a unswitched FCU, supplying rewired internal and external lighting. Oh and I even levelled up the sockets - neighbourly relations and all.

 

[Baddegg]

Couldn’t visually confirm main earth and water bond..someone’s concreted em in....

Assuming that’s the water bond that was tucked behind the board?......

 

[James]

I think the DNO needs to be involved,

main fuse missing.

also looks like something has been on fire?

wonder what horror lies beneath that newish looking concrete.

 

[Baddegg]

Better pic for ya @James.....sneaky things them fuses....

Low Ze though....I particularly like the front on the Henley block missing..

 

[James]

it's great when you need to pull the main fuse and discover that the seals are missing anyway.

also, i take it back, not a fire. just a lot of dirt!!

just read the sub note, didn't realise that was a Henley, thought originally it was MET.

Its been a Long day!

 

[Baddegg]

it's great when you need to pull the main fuse and discover that the seals are missing anyway.

also, i take it back, not a fire. just a lot of dirt!!

I’ll admit the fairies visit me a lot but on this occasion they had been and long gone ?

 

[GBDamo]

God loves a trier.

 

[MFS Electrical]

God loves a trier.

But that looks like the work of a chancer not a trier

 

[Baddegg]

God loves a trier.

WTF were they “trying” to do ?

 

[James]

WTF were they “trying” to do ?

No green/yellow sleeve to hand. Never mind I will use brown instead!

 

[Baddegg]

No green/yellow sleeve to hand. Never mind I will use brown instead!

Ha ha yep that’ll be perfectly clear for the next poor sod?....is me or the picture or have they put the lines and neutrals in together?

 

[GBDamo]

Ha ha yep that’ll be perfectly clear for the next poor sod?....is me or the picture or have they put the lines and neutrals in together?

No, they're those cheap and nasty sockets with the N terminal at the bottom and L ath the top, dead handy for testing.

 

[littlespark]

Brown is the colour of earth, when you’re talking about soil. You can see how they got confused with it.

I’m surprised they bothered to use any trunking.

By the look of the slatted wall, would this be in perhaps a shop of some kind?

 

[GBDamo]

Brown is the colour of earth, when you’re talking about soil. You can see how they got confused with it.

I’m surprised they bothered to use any trunking.

By the look of the slatted wall, would this be in perhaps a shop of some kind?

Little shop of horrors.

Where I found the Fig 8 ring.

They wanted new sockets everywhere.

Took one look at the board and above the ceiling and said new circuits in a new board, I aint touching that.

Literally every place I looked was wrong, everywhere.

New RCBO board, 5 new circuits, 22 DSOs, cert and walk away advising them the rest needs attention.

 

[Baddegg]

That’s the fibreglass bath bonded then.....

 

[Pete999]

That’s the fibreglass bath bonded then.....View attachment 54533

Wonder if it was proved to be Extraneous???

 

[Baddegg]

Wonder if it was proved to be Extraneous???

Wouldn’t have thought so....plastic feet on a wooden floor (upstairs) with plastic tap tails......I reckon wet pants took and old steel bath out and panicked

 

[Pete999]

Wouldn’t have thought so....plastic feet on a wooden floor (upstairs) with plastic tap tails......I reckon wet pants took and old steel bath out and panicked

Maybe thought he got a belt off the bath only realising later he had smacked his funny bone on the waste pipe.

 

[Baddegg]

Maybe thought he got a belt off the bath only realising later he had smacked his funny bone on the waste pipe.

Probably mate that was leaking as well ?

 

[Pete999]

Probably mate that was leaking as well ?

what he had a water belt then?

 

[Stevie g]

Having my van repaired at garage, went to there toilet, not on the picture but above sink was water heater on plug top. Plug top was in sink.
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Doing periodic on farmers retail complex, started having a good look around to familiarise myself with the complex of small barn retailers, came across this (photo s) went and spoke to owner, he said been through separation and that supply is his ex wife s,

 

[SparkyChick]

So I got a call from an existing client telling me he needed my help. He informed me WPD were there replacing the main fuse because it had blown and then this happened.



Nice reminder of the power of what provides us with a job.

From what I can gather the guys from WPD were called out to a loss of power and found the fuse had blown. When they replaced it, it all kicked off. The board is a Lewden board with what I believe is a 100A MK main switch feeding a 32A MCB that supplied an armoured cable to the garage. They didn't open the small board and I have no idea whether they did any kind of testing but they were kind enough to install the isolator and hand me the fuse when I arrived (along with a stick on seal for it). There was water dripping into the cabinet from the hole where the cables exited, which I'm hoping is just from a dodgy seal along the top edge, but they were speculating that the water had damaged the small board. The cores of the SWA it supplied were covered in soot and I wasn't able to establish whether there was any heat damage to them but around where they entered the bedding they don't look right but there was no visible copper. IR tests on that cable were quite low, not enough to be the cause of that devastation but low enough for me to decline immediate reconnection without further investigation... that and the armour wasn't earthed at the supply.

So, when I get back there to sort out a replacement for that little board, my first stop is going to be the garage board and some extensive tests on the cable. Will let you guys know what I find

 

[James]

I think that 32A breaker might have been the root cause.

breaker either had a loose connection or an internal fault possibly due to water?
melted the casing until the internal parts were able to reach the back plate of the board.

arcing for a while until it took out the main fuse.

then it all set hard with the short now welded to the back plate just waiting to be reconnected.

lots of heat generated when new fuse installed and therefore the subsequent fire.

you can clearly see where it has melted through the metal din rail and back of enclosure.

 

[Strima]

I've seen that before on a voltage regulator, water ingress blew the incoming fuses as the arc tracked between L2 & L3, went with a bit of a pop...

 

[davesparks]

my first stop is going to be the garage board and some extensive tests on the cable. Will let you guys know what I find

Strip the burnt end back and inspect it first, it's most likely just covered in soot rather than damaged.
As James has said the location of the fault is obvious from the chunk missing out if the breaker and the hole in the steel enclosure.

 

[Strima]

Nice tidy installation for a change, oh wait....

Eddies back for Xmas.

Slight damp problem

Covers are so overrated

Terminate the armour, never heard of the like in all my days...

Happy Friday kids!!!

 

[SJD]

Changing a light fitting in a new build today, … seems the ceilings were all spray painted, after the second fix.

 

[Baddegg]

Bit of advice please,do you think this notch is big enough for the 4mm bonding?

 

[telectrix]

Bit of advice please,do you think this notch is big enough for the 4mm bonding?View attachment 55046

that's lateral thinking. sparks has used the notch cut by a wet-pants in the wrong place to save getting his combi drilll off the van.

 

[pirate]

Looking at that pic, SJD, imagine the comments on here when the chap asks how to wire his new ceiling lamp...
"Did you take a pic of the existing connections?"
"no, mate, no point...they're all white!"

 

[Pete999]

Bit of advice please,do you think this notch is big enough for the 4mm bonding?View attachment 55046

Yes so is the hole next to it

 

[littlespark]

Does the property actually need 4mm bonding? Doesn’t look like there’s any pipe work to be bonded with all those empty holes.

 

[Baddegg]

Does the property actually need 4mm bonding? Doesn’t look like there’s any pipe work to be bonded with all those empty holes.

No mate, it’s the same cable that was bonding the fibre glass bath I posted a while back, I forget to put it up at the time...apparently all that damage (most of the joists look like that) was done a few years back when a wet pants spent 3 months putting in a central heating system.....
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[Midwest]

Incidentally, do plumbers abide by the same regs as us, for holes and slots in joists? Serious questioned, like how would a 28mm pipe or waste pipe, be able to be installed at right angles to joists.

 

[telectrix]

Incidentally, do plumbers abide by the same regs as us, for holes and slots in joists? Serious questioned, like how would a 28mm pipe or waste pipe, be able to be installed at right angles to joists.

a wet-pants wouldn't know a right angle if it bit him in the arse.

 

[Baddegg]

Incidentally, do plumbers abide by the same regs as us, for holes and slots in joists? Serious questioned, like how would a 28mm pipe or waste pipe, be able to be installed at right angles to joists.

Yes mate, they are building regs, same for all I believe,
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Yes mate, they are building regs, same for all I believe,

Although I’ve never met a wet pants that believes they apply to them ?

 

[westward10]

Every switch I look in is like this.

 

[Midwest]

Yes mate, they are building regs, same for all I believe,

Not got my building regs guide book with me, but thought the matter was based on guidance from some British Standard, as opposed directly mentioned in a Building Regulation?

Not withstanding the reg in BS 7671.

 

[FatAlan]

a wet-pants wouldn't know a right angle if it bit him in the arse.

I’m sensing years and years of ingrained hostility and prejudice against plumbers bubbling to the surface here.

 

[telectrix]

not bubbling mate...seething. was a plumber stole my socket tester. a plumber stole my set of wera screwdrivers. was a plumber that burnt 10 of my alarm cables with his blowtorch. was a plumber that that threaded his plastic pipes through my cable holes. nah, i don't dislike plumbers, i hate them with a passion ( appart from Barry the Bath that fixes wet things that i come across from time to time. fair price and reliable.if youse on forum Barry, a bottle of Laphroiag would be welcome).).