Change in the Law regarding RCDs in Rental Properties

[Fleetwood]

I hope you will allow me to make a comment on your thread. I firmly believe all properties should have a RCD fitted. I'm retired now but when I was a telephone engineer - a long time ago - we often had leakage faults which would cause havoc with the old 'Party Lines'. These, if you recall, were two telephones sharing the same exchange line (one pair of wires) for speech but using a local earth for signalling. Well, as you can imagine, an earth leakage at one property could ring telephone bells in half a street! To find the culprit property we'd earth another telephone line back at the Exchange, which could be a couple of miles away and then using a connection to that earth, locate the fault by measuring the potential difference between that and the local earth. Using something as simple as a wire attached to a screw driver, we could take readings off the ground, and following the highest, get led right to the property with the leak and to the actual fault itself. Quite often faulty immersion heaters or plug in appliances. Cooker rings were a favourite. Often the owner would tell us they'd been having 'tingles' from the taps! RCD's absolutely a good idea.

 

[IQ Electrical]

I hope you will allow me to make a comment on your thread. I firmly believe all properties should have a RCD fitted. I'm retired now but when I was a telephone engineer - a long time ago - we often had leakage faults which would cause havoc with the old 'Party Lines'. These, if you recall, were two telephones sharing the same exchange line (one pair of wires) for speech but using a local earth for signalling. Well, as you can imagine, an earth leakage at one property could ring telephone bells in half a street! To find the culprit property we'd earth another telephone line back at the Exchange, which could be a couple of miles away and then using a connection to that earth, locate the fault by measuring the potential difference between that and the local earth. Using something as simple as a wire attached to a screw driver, we could take readings off the ground, and following the highest, get led right to the property with the leak and to the actual fault itself. Quite often faulty immersion heaters or plug in appliances. Cooker rings were a favourite. Often the owner would tell us they'd been having 'tingles' from the taps! RCD's absolutely a good idea.

I don't think anyone here would disagree that RCDs are 'a good idea' but forcing the retrospective installation of RCDs is an entirely different prospect!

 

[Dave 85]

The funny thing is, there is not even any concrete requirement to have new builds blanket RCD protected. If it was a flat (not ground floor) all studwork, with cables >50mm deep, then you could get away with just bathrooms.
If there is no blanket requirement for RCD's on new builds, Im not quite sure how nick expects them to be made mandatory for old properties.

 

[IQ Electrical]

The funny thing is, there is not even any concrete requirement to have new builds blanket RCD protected. If it was a flat (not ground floor) all studwork, with cables >50mm deep, then you could get away with just bathrooms.
If there is no blanket requirement for RCD's on new builds, Im not quite sure how nick expects them to be made mandatory for old properties.

Well you'd still have all socket outlets for general use and all circuits in special locations requiring 30mA RCD protection (assuming the studwork was wooden) but I see your point.

 

[Geoffsd]

I hope you will allow me to make a comment on your thread. I firmly believe all properties should have a RCD fitted. I'm retired now but when I was a telephone engineer - a long time ago - we often had leakage faults which would cause havoc with the old 'Party Lines'. These, if you recall, were two telephones sharing the same exchange line (one pair of wires) for speech but using a local earth for signalling. Well, as you can imagine, an earth leakage at one property could ring telephone bells in half a street! To find the culprit property we'd earth another telephone line back at the Exchange, which could be a couple of miles away and then using a connection to that earth, locate the fault by measuring the potential difference between that and the local earth. Using something as simple as a wire attached to a screw driver, we could take readings off the ground, and following the highest, get led right to the property with the leak and to the actual fault itself. Quite often faulty immersion heaters or plug in appliances. Cooker rings were a favourite. Often the owner would tell us they'd been having 'tingles' from the taps! RCD's absolutely a good idea.

Perhaps The GPO should have used their own wiring.
Was that back when we had to wait three months for a telephone? - if we were lucky.
(Just imagine the kids today going to Carphone Warehouse and ordering a phone for October.)

There is nothing to stop everyone in the country having RCDs fitted if they wish.

We just don't need any more laws which are not enforced, or do you envisage 'The RCD Police'.

 

[Fleetwood]

Perhaps The GPO should have used their own wiring.
Was that back when we had to wait three months for a telephone? - if we were lucky.
(Just imagine the kids today going to Carphone Warehouse and ordering a phone for October.)

There is nothing to stop everyone in the country having RCDs fitted if they wish.

We just don't need any more laws which are not enforced, or do you envisage 'The RCD Police'.

Not sure what you mean by using our own wiring. Our earth connection had to a spiked earth separate to any Consumer earth. But in the end, earth is earth when it's only yards between them. Thats why we couldn't locate the leakage without an earth some distance away to give the Potenial difference.
Yes it was a lot different in those days. Any colour phone as long as it's black at one time. If you owned a nice big red fire engine we could give you a red one!

 

[thewisdomgeeza]

see here for cheap RCB's and various other items
http://www.electriciansforums.net/e...ess-stock-various-brands-bnib.html#post565573

 

[Myra]

Hello I am Myra. It is good to know about the change of law for the benefit of public at large. I can get the idea through this platform about change law about RCDs in rental properties for the welfare of people.

 

[jase1638]

A £10 modification to prevent a potential death - no brainer to me

 

[Knobhead]

Hello I am Myra. It is good to know about the change of law for the benefit of public at large. I can get the idea through this platform about change law about RCDs in rental properties for the welfare of people.

The only thing this thread is about is the welfare of electricians bank accounts.

 

[Dave 85]

A £10 modification to prevent a potential death - no brainer to me

A £10 modification???
Is that what you charge for a 17th CU upgrade plus full testing and rectification????
Fancy doing mine?

 

[Dave 85]

The only thing this thread is about is the welfare of electricians bank accounts.

The same can be said of most of this particular OP's threads. Why it got, and has remained, sticky'd is beyond me...

 

[TIGGERTOM13]

I agree about the rcd, if there is no rcd protection at it is classed as unsatisfactory. If the sockets have rcd protection and nothing else all the bathroom circuits should all be bonded together along with the pipework. But then there is still the problem of cables not buried below 50mm or protrected by earhthed screen.

 

[houstonaccessco]

No more question, I have cleared my doubt. Thank you for sharing.

 

[dchester]

I can see that this is a great idea - but only if I wear my Electrician's Hat because it would be a government enforced ticket for us to print money. There are a lot of installations with no RCD and even old wired fuses. Currently if the system is safe there is no requirement for the Landlord to spend money on it but with legislation forcing the use of RCDs, we would have a field day upgrading installations, not just fitting an RCD.

If I wear my Landlord's Hat, however, it takes on a completely different shade! If an installation is safe, why should I be forced to cough up a great deal of money on my properties just to protect someone who is daft enough to take a bath with an electric bar heater? And, in many installations, simply fitting a global RCD will not be possible for reasons already mentioned, so the consumer unit would need to be replaced and possibly the entire property wiring. Provided the wiring is safe why should I have to do this?

Secondly: You cannot compare electrical and gas installations. Electricity can not fall out of the wires, filling the house with explosive and suffocating gasses. Neither can it fill the house with lethal carbon monoxide if the kettle suddenly decides to malfunction. I'm sure that the plumbers out there would all like an annual inspection certificate forced upon landlords too. Heaven forbid if all the water fell out of a pipe, filling the house and drowning the poor tenants! I don't need a Plumber's Hat to see that one's daft but, hopefully, you get my point.

If I put on my Computer Consultant's hat I can demand that the Government bring in annual computer checks to ensure that your computer is not infested with viruses and adverts which are emailing themselves to all the innocent victims contained in the computer's address book and then on to all of their address book contents too. The spread of computer viruses and trojans is a menace to society and must be stamped out. The cost to the internet providers and email hosts for electricity used in processing this vast quantity of spam must be quite significant. Our own email server is hit by up to 20 thousand spam emails a day, over 99% of which are, thankfully, filtered out by our software, but a computer CPU uses far more power when processing than it does at rest. Help me stamp out this menace now by writing to your MP demanding an annual PC cleanliness check!


Thanks

David

 

[trev]

While we're on dchester can we tag on a provision to check all domestic kitchens each week for potentially harmful bacteria and force every parent to undergo food hygene training. You never know what could be going on and if we're going to have a nanny state it may as well be done properly

 

[dchester]

I like the way your mind works Trev.

While we are on it perhaps they should add a germ detection to the MOT test in order to check car seats for harmful bacteria. Hmmm. perhaps not

David

 

[AV-Nik]

Good Idea. I lost a nephew from old sockets. An RCD 'may' have saved his life.

 

[Knobhead]

What's a good idea?

 

[Dave 85]

Welcome to Nics nanny state where all electricians are millionaires and everyones else has starved to death through poverty. Its for their own good mind, cos now they have RCD's.

 

[Marvo]

It's been a legal requirement where I am for several years already that RCD's are fitted to protect all socket circuits and certain equipment in bathroom zones. Old properties without RCD's aren't illegal but if they ever want extra socket circuits or alterations to existing ones then an RCD would then need to be fitted protecting all socket circuits so a certificate of compliance (EICR) could be issued. Also if a property changes hands it needs certifying so again an RCD would need to be fitted.

The issue is that portable appliances by their nature are responsible for a high percentage of shocks received by the user of an electrical installation. Appliances are prone to trailing cable damage, impact damage and water ingress making a higher likelyhood of broken cpc's or exposed conductors/live parts etc .

I always assumed the reason the UK hasn't adopted a blanket requirement for RCD's on circuits supplying plug-in appliances is because you have rigorous portable appliance testing instead but from what I've read about this in real life I can't help thinking that tighter RCD requirements might not be a bad thing.

 

[Spazz]

Marvo - there is no legal requirement at present to have a RCD installed on your shower or anything like that - it is only a recommendation.
BS7671 is regulations - regulations are recommendations - Acts are legal requirements.

Electricians must install RCDs because BS7671 states they should be installed and when an electrician signs off work s/he is stating that it complies to BS7671.

Fully agree with the appliances being the biggest cause of electric shocks - but an RCD will pick up any damaged appliances and isolate them before a risk(or death) occurs - a fuse will only sometimes "blow"

PAT testing is not a legal requirement either - its a recommendation - the only reason the government wont adopt RCDs in every house is because of money and not enough people have died!


But again fully agree with tighter RCD requirements

 

[UNG]

Fully agree with the appliances being the biggest cause of electric shocks - but an RCD will pick up any damaged appliances and isolate them before a risk(or death) occurs - a fuse will only sometimes "blow"

Assuming it is working correctly I have found so many non functional RCD's it's difficult to have faith that they will work when needed and let's face it how many people press the test button regularly or are you looking to make that law as well

PAT testing is not a legal requirement either - its a recommendation - the only reason the government wont adopt RCDs in every house is because of money and not enough people have died!

Although PAT testing is not a legal requirement it satisfies the requirements of proving adequate maintenance under the EAWR and as the EAWR is a statute document there is a need to comply with it

 

[Knobhead]

Assuming it is working correctly I have found so many non functional RCD's it's difficult to have faith that they will work when needed and let's face it how many people press the test button regularly

You've made me think UNG, how many times do we get people advocating all RCBO boards on here now? More gubbins in a smaller package, all the more chance of failure. Food for thought.

 

[UNG]

Tony, hadn't thought about that one all the problems I have come across were single or dual RCD boards but then again the proliferation of RCBO's is a more recent thing and not had time to fail yet. This now begs the question how many actually test all the RCBO's they have fitted or is it assumed that if one works they all do

 

[Knobhead]

......

 

[Engineer54]

At least when and if an RCBO fails, it will only effect the one circuit, and not 5 or 6 unrelated circuits as is the case with the compromised integrity of dual RCD 17th CU's.

 

[Knobhead]

So if you get a neutral to earth fault and it just so happens the circuit is protected by a faulty RCBO what happens then?

 

[Dan]

I'm just bumping some of the older threads in the general electrical forum that had a lot of replies. They might not be current topics, if they're not, just ignore them and they'll soon drop off the list. If you DO wish to add a reply and get the conversation going again, feel free to do so. Your input might help somebody else in the future.

 

[DPG]

This thread has become more relevant I suppose now, with the tighter regulations around RCD's in domestic environments in amendment 3 of the regs. Daz