Help with replacement shower

[JOHN8874]

Hi. I am a part qualified Electrician, Iv been working as an electricians mate for around a year having decided to retrain aged 30. I have level 3 City and Guilds, EAL inspection and testing and 17th edition.
I have been building up by skills and knowledge whilst working with a full qualified spark.

A family member has just moved into a new house. Shortly after the shower died. I can say fairly confidently that the house need a full rewire but at present having just moved house they don't have the cash for it. The plan is to rewire it within the next 12 months as they start to make changes to the house and can make chases for new sockets etc.

Basically the shower died on not long after they moved in and they want i t replacing asap.

The house is supplied by a 4 way rewirable Wylex board. There is an extension with 4 circuits supplied by a single 45a fuse switch disconnector.

The switch disconnector is terminated into the fuse board at the same position as the incoming mains tails!

Iv done some basic checks and the incoming Gas is bonded but the water does not appear to be. The water as been moved from the Gas/Elec cupboard at some point and the earth clamp and the old 10mm which supplied it is still there which gives the game away.
The incoming water is now in the kitchen/extension and is not bonded :annoyed: .

The old 10.5kw Shower was supplied on the old main fuse board by 6mm cable.

The 6mm t+e comes up under the bath where it enters a JB. In The other end of the JB is the 6mm t=e supply for the shower switch on the landing wall.
The pipes for the shower and bath taps (the shower is over the bath) are supplementary bonded but the cable is terminated into the JB in the CPC terminal!

My intention was split the meter tails and take a feed into a new C/U to supply the shower, in effect 'divorcing' this from the old fuse board and the dodgy extension wiring. I would go for a lower powered shower to be in limits for the 6mm cable.

My thinking was that I would just take an earth conductor from the MET to the Water main (in its new position) and then go ahead with the new C/U plan.

They would need a new C/U when the house is rewired so I can just add circuits as and when. At least the shower would be protected by an RCD and have a suitable protective device.

However given the situation with the JB and the bathroom bonding being terminated into a JB, I'm not sure how to proceed.

Can anyone give me some input?

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

 

[ferg]

All this comes under part Pee in Englandshire.

So you would need to notify it.

I'm not sure what forum etiquette is here about advising on this kind of thing.

 

[Pete999]

Can the guy you are working with no help you out? without first hand sight of this job it seems like a right mish mash, I can understand your relations dilemma about paying for a rewire. Several things spring to mind from your description, is supplementary bonding required, have you tested the pipewok, is there an RCD present anywhere?? the JB under the bath worries me 6mm into s JB, what rating is the JB?

You say you are in training, I would ask your mate who you say is qualified to take a look see. Sorry I can't offer any more help, would need to look first hand to be able to help more.

May be one of the forum members who live up your neck of the woods could take a look, bit to far for me I'm afraid.

 

[JOHN8874]

Can the guy you are working with no help you out? without first hand sight of this job it seems like a right mish mash, I can understand your relations dilemma about paying for a rewire. Several things spring to mind from your description, is supplementary bonding required, have you tested the pipewok, is there an RCD present anywhere?? the JB under the bath worries me 6mm into s JB, what rating is the JB?

You say you are in training, I would ask your mate who you say is qualified to take a look see. Sorry I can't offer any more help, would need to look first hand to be able to help more.

May be one of the forum members who live up your neck of the woods could take a look, bit to far for me I'm afraid.

Hi Pete. Thanks for replying.

The guys I work with are advising me and would take a look if I asked. It was their idea to put the shower on a separate board and split the meter tails.

There is at present no RCD protection for any circuit in the house. The proposed new C/U would take care of that for the shower at least. A second option to expand on that would be to take the meter tails directly into the new board, supplying the shower via one RCD and then take a feed from the other side of the new board back to the old fuse board, thus giving the existing circuits RCD protection in the mean time.

The incoming Gas pipe is bonded and has continuity (from conductor disconnected from the MET to avoid parallel paths right onto the copper pipework). The incoming water isn't bonded though.

I did a Zs on the shower circuit in in current state and it came well within limits.


What seems odd is that the supplementary bonding to the bath/shower pip work is terminated in with the shower supply cable's CPC (in the JB)?! IS this normal? I have never seen this having worked on mainly new installations thus far.

I have a load of pics on my phone of the installation which I will upload shortly.

Cheers.

 

[sparksburnout]

If it is only a 4 way old board why don't you and the family members stop arsing about and just replace it FFS?

 

[JOHN8874]

If it is only a 4 way old board why don't you and the family members stop arsing about and just replace it FFS?

Hi, burnout. Not sure what your problem is or why you feel the need to be so aggressive in your posts on an internet forum. Anyway, no offence taken. I'm not sure there is any 'arsing about' going on, they are committed to a full rewire in the not too distant future and are happy to purchase a 10 way split load metal clad consumer unit straight away in order to get the shower back up and running in as safer way as possible in the mean time, as per my advice.

I want to get the new board on with just the shower circuit for as a priority but intend to start adding circuits to the new board over the coming weeks.

 

[PEG]

Hi bud,just what was your Zs within limits,for?:heart:

 

[JOHN8874]

Well, a picture can tell a thousand words so here are a few pics I took earlier today.
This is the current fuse board with the 45a switch which supplies the extension (the shower is in the old part of the house and was fed from the original board)

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[Darkwood]

If it is only a 4 way old board why don't you and the family members stop arsing about and just replace it FFS?

There is absolutely no need for this sort of response, the OP is training up and asking for advice, if you cannot respond without been abrasive and brash then I suggest you log off for the night and sleep it off as this is the second warning you have had within the space of 2 hours.

Such responses only instigate reaction and negative replies, this generally takes the thread off topic and helps no-one. Consider this the last warning on the matter.

 

[JOHN8874]

 

[JOHN8874]

 

[JOHN8874]

 

[Richard Burns]

If the water supply is an extraneous conductive part then you must bond this as it is required as part of the protective measure for the shower.

If you are only providing 30mA RCD protection to the shower and there are other circuits in the bathroom then the simultaneously accessible exposed and extraneous conductive parts in the bathroom should be supplementary bonded together.

Supplementary bonding connects these parts together so that they are all always at (close to) the same potential; supplementary bonding should be connected to the cpcs of circuits in the location. From what you describe this is what has been done (at least to some extent)

 

[JOHN8874]

 

[JOHN8874]

 

[sparksburnout]

There is absolutely no need for this sort of response, the OP is training up and asking for advice, if you cannot respond without been abrasive and brash then I suggest you log off for the night and sleep it off as this is the second warning you have had within the space of 2 hours.

Such responses only instigate reaction and negative replies, this generally takes the thread off topic and helps no-one. Consider this the last warning on the matter.

The OP started off the post by saying he is a part qualified electrician. At least one other member has commented negatively, if he's part qualified should he be doing this? I think you will find the other warning was for a political comment and nothing whatsoever to do with this area. How is this work going to be notified???

 

[JOHN8874]

Thanks, Richard. This was my understanding of equipotential bonding, Iv just never seen the bonding conductor in a JB before so it threw me. Will I still have to get a conductor from the MET to the water supply either way before proceeding, (Im fairly sure the answer to this is yes!)

Cheers

 

[Richard Burns]

You would need to test the water pipes to see if they are extraneous conductive parts, it is possible that the new water supply was put in in plastic piping and that the house copper piping is not introducing an earth potential. If this were to be the case then bonding to the water would not be required.
In any other case where there is an earth potential introduced into the installation then bonding to the water would be required.

 

[Darkwood]

The OP started off the post by saying he is a part qualified electrician. At least one other member has commented negatively, if he's part qualified should he be doing this? I think you will find the other warning was for a political comment and nothing whatsoever to do with this area. How is this work going to be notified???

Its not negative comments in general that concern me, you can post negative comments in a nicer format to give contructive advice, both the manner of the comments in this thread and the one you were pulled for in another thread would bait for a conflictive response, I'm well aware they were very different topics behind them but the two warnings are more or less saying the same thing - you took on a personal abrasive tone in them and we don't want to see that kind of response. If you feel your not happy with any member be it the advice they are asking for or simply their attitude etc then please use the report button and let the staff decide, please don't take it on yourself to write such responses.

 

[sparksburnout]

OK I will put forward a very simple and hopefully non-abrasive question: How is this new circuit going to be notified?