nicky151

nicky151 · Jun 2, 2010

Hi i'm new to this site and have no idea on electrical safety so please bear with me. i live in a prewar mid terraced house, i recently called my homecare insurers to come and check a light fitting for me. he checked the electrics and told me that my upstairs lights were not earthed (3 bedrooms) all the sockets upstairs and downstairs are earthed and also the downstairs lights, he also told me that the fuse box i had fitted downstairs 3 years ago was not 17th edition and needed changing, he told me not to use the lights upstairs as the house could go on fire very easily because of no earth. i immediatly removed the bulbs from the 3 bedrooms and went and bought plug in lamps, i also renewed my fire alarms and was extremely worried that one of my childrens bedrooms could go up in smoke at anytime. I was quoted £1194 to fix the problem. money i just dont have. I applied to birmingham city councils help scheme that can sometimes depending on your circumstances help with the financial cost of an immediate repair that urgently needs doing. i had an inspector come out only to tell me that my lights were perfectly safe to use and that most houses of this age did not have earth to the upstairs lighting, he said that as long as i didnt use metal light fittings there was no risk to safety and that this scenario was quite common. who's right and whose wrong, and are me and my children safe. any advice would be most welcome thanx. nicky151

Sintra · Jun 2, 2010

The inspector who came out is correct your lights without an earth is ok so long as they are class 2 fittings. ie not metal.

Your fuse box could not be 17th edition if it was fitted 3 years ago and the 17th only came out in July 2008 no need to replace so long as it is safe.

Have a look here.

http://esc.org.uk/pdfs/business-and-community/electrical-industry/BPG1v2_web.pdf

wallyanker · Jun 2, 2010

Totally agree with Sintra.

Just because new regulations come out does not mean everybody must upgrade immediately, only new installations and alteration work must comply to the new regulations. If your CU was fitted 3 years ago and you have all relevant paper work/test results, there will be nothing wrong with it.

Lizard King · Jun 2, 2010

It sounds to me like the inspector (your 2nd visitor) has it right....

It is indeed quite normal on older wiring installations to only have a live and neutral connection to ceiling light points. What you need to do is somehow check if all your fittings are double-insulated in which case there is no earth required as there are no metallic parts which can be easily touched or which can become 'live' in the event of a fault. The same applies to all your wall-switches. The symbol for double-insulated is a square within a square. If you are unable to check this then a cheaper option may well be to look at installing all new double-insulated fittings and switches, rather than re-wire everything....?

The comment about the existing arrangement being a fire hazard is a bit of a red herring, as earthing is in fact in place to prevent electric shocks to persons. If there is an overload or short-circuit fault on the lighting circuit then your fuse back at the fuse-box should still operate as a means of protection.

Having said all that, I'd recommend getting a second opinion from another electircian, as it sounds like your wiring is of a particular 'vintage' that would benefit from a complete re-wire in any case...!

acat · Jun 2, 2010

You are safe the second person gave correct advice as for the first shower I would send a leter of complaint to them as there are causing you an awful lot of worry for nothing all they want from you is profit.

Chris

Spudnik · Jun 2, 2010

So why wasnt the lack of cpc picked up on the CU change?

Anyhow, the lighting could IDEALLY do with rewiring upstairs, however, as others have said, provided there are no metal switches or light fittings, then it should be ok.

I would however, recommend an RCD put in place for the circuit.