O
overskilled
Warning - Rant
Went out yesterday to look at a interior porch light that wasn't working...dead as doornails since the front door was replaced....A year and a half ago.........
Get there, light is dead, wiring a bit of a disaster inside the switch box (scruits and corroded CPCs....seems the porch had a water leak recently that went unnoticed for a while....looks like it was running down the cavity and humidity has been hitting the unsleeved CPC), sort out the jumble, (looped in at the switch)...check the fuse (in the back of a cupboard without any light and at right angles to natural light so pitch black)....not blown, however the upstairs fuse is blown, swap them over, upstairs lights come on....nothing at the porch though.
Closer look at the fuse carrier for the upstairs lights....heat damage to carrier and looks like its been arcing and trying to set itself alight. wiring looks ok with no damage. Inform the customer that CU needs swapped out, they agree after I show them the fuse carrier.
Thats when the....fun starts, lift the floor....slope up to the hatch and a gap of 12 inches at the highest and about 6- 8 inches at the tightest with what looks like a streets worth of builders rubble in the bottom. 6mm2 Bonding disconnected so replaced it with 10mm2. Took about 3 times as long due to the lack of space and the mad collection of pipework the plumbers had ever so helpful run all over the place:censored: (much banging and scraping of various appendages occurred )
Manage finally to get out, get the power off and the old box disconnected, mark whats what with tape, eventually find a space the new (small) CU will fit into...getting on reasonably well, though notice a few "oddities" to be investigated further (left one cable disconnected.....6mm2 T+E connected directly to the fusebox incomer with no overprotection....informed the customer, agreed action is to look at it later, in the meantime she will keep an eye out for anything that isn't working....and also looks like someone in the past has spurred a socket directly off the ring fuse rather than the ring itself due to a lack of ways in the old MEM rewireable fusebox, so looking into that further next time)
Light is fading by this point
Then the head torch goes on the blink :censored:, thankfully I have my spare LED torch that the customer offers to hold so I can get finished and then.....discover the tails are 1 inch too short ( literally an inch, due to having to move the CU from where I intially wanted to put it due to space issues).:censored::censored:...tails split in the past by someone years ago so relocated the ancient henley type block (live and neutral in 2 different bars inside one enclosure....probably original to the 1969 house or not much newer) serious fun as some muppet tore most of the head off the mounting screws, which made them a pain to remove.....) and then the back of the henley decided to crack.... :censored::censored::censored: brittle as brittle can be....
Got the cover on the henley (agreed course of action with the customer is to come back and replace the henley with a pair of modern replacements and renew the tails), energised, everything working ok (apart from a heart stopping moment when the upstairs lights took a few seconds to come on...cold old CFLs).
Though customer had cash waiting, (makes a nice change for someone not to quibble over a reasonable price) and left me to crack on apart from asking if I wanted a coffee etc at various intervals
The last piece of fun being my ratchet straps did a vanishing act, so tied the ladder down with some rope and got taken for £18 in B&Q for 2 (small B&Q thankfully just round the corner).....though had no other option as it was almost 6 by this stage and it was blowing a gale.
Next time - Try and find whats stopping this porch light getting power including drilling out the screws holding the back box in place as the head has been totally stripped off by someone in the past....replace the tails and the henley with 2 new separate henley blocks in 25mm2.
I'm glad I have a day off today....my patience needs a break from dealing with bodges, my back is turning black and blue along with my knees, shins and elbows....seriously I should have been a commando....
Went out yesterday to look at a interior porch light that wasn't working...dead as doornails since the front door was replaced....A year and a half ago.........
Get there, light is dead, wiring a bit of a disaster inside the switch box (scruits and corroded CPCs....seems the porch had a water leak recently that went unnoticed for a while....looks like it was running down the cavity and humidity has been hitting the unsleeved CPC), sort out the jumble, (looped in at the switch)...check the fuse (in the back of a cupboard without any light and at right angles to natural light so pitch black)....not blown, however the upstairs fuse is blown, swap them over, upstairs lights come on....nothing at the porch though.
Closer look at the fuse carrier for the upstairs lights....heat damage to carrier and looks like its been arcing and trying to set itself alight. wiring looks ok with no damage. Inform the customer that CU needs swapped out, they agree after I show them the fuse carrier.
Thats when the....fun starts, lift the floor....slope up to the hatch and a gap of 12 inches at the highest and about 6- 8 inches at the tightest with what looks like a streets worth of builders rubble in the bottom. 6mm2 Bonding disconnected so replaced it with 10mm2. Took about 3 times as long due to the lack of space and the mad collection of pipework the plumbers had ever so helpful run all over the place:censored: (much banging and scraping of various appendages occurred )
Manage finally to get out, get the power off and the old box disconnected, mark whats what with tape, eventually find a space the new (small) CU will fit into...getting on reasonably well, though notice a few "oddities" to be investigated further (left one cable disconnected.....6mm2 T+E connected directly to the fusebox incomer with no overprotection....informed the customer, agreed action is to look at it later, in the meantime she will keep an eye out for anything that isn't working....and also looks like someone in the past has spurred a socket directly off the ring fuse rather than the ring itself due to a lack of ways in the old MEM rewireable fusebox, so looking into that further next time)
Light is fading by this point
Then the head torch goes on the blink :censored:, thankfully I have my spare LED torch that the customer offers to hold so I can get finished and then.....discover the tails are 1 inch too short ( literally an inch, due to having to move the CU from where I intially wanted to put it due to space issues).:censored::censored:...tails split in the past by someone years ago so relocated the ancient henley type block (live and neutral in 2 different bars inside one enclosure....probably original to the 1969 house or not much newer) serious fun as some muppet tore most of the head off the mounting screws, which made them a pain to remove.....) and then the back of the henley decided to crack.... :censored::censored::censored: brittle as brittle can be....
Got the cover on the henley (agreed course of action with the customer is to come back and replace the henley with a pair of modern replacements and renew the tails), energised, everything working ok (apart from a heart stopping moment when the upstairs lights took a few seconds to come on...cold old CFLs).
Though customer had cash waiting, (makes a nice change for someone not to quibble over a reasonable price) and left me to crack on apart from asking if I wanted a coffee etc at various intervals
The last piece of fun being my ratchet straps did a vanishing act, so tied the ladder down with some rope and got taken for £18 in B&Q for 2 (small B&Q thankfully just round the corner).....though had no other option as it was almost 6 by this stage and it was blowing a gale.
Next time - Try and find whats stopping this porch light getting power including drilling out the screws holding the back box in place as the head has been totally stripped off by someone in the past....replace the tails and the henley with 2 new separate henley blocks in 25mm2.
I'm glad I have a day off today....my patience needs a break from dealing with bodges, my back is turning black and blue along with my knees, shins and elbows....seriously I should have been a commando....
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