Discuss Pulling live meter tails from isolater switch in consumer unit in the UK Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

An exposed live part, such as with a missing DB blank, is an immediate danger.
Playing devil's advocate.
It's not immediately dangerous if someone doesn't stick their fingers in. "Most" people wouldn't think of sticking their fingers in.
An ES lamp in a holder without a big shroud will have an exposed live shell - waiting to zap people who would not expect it to be live. So why isn't that immediately dangerous - it doesn't need a fault to be live. And it will still be live when switched off at the wall if it's a single pole switch.
.C1, C2, C3 does not represent levels of how bad you think something is, they are codes with clearly defined meanings.
In theory - but look at how many "discussions" we have here about coding !

Yes everything connected to the neutral bar at the DB will be at line voltage, but it will all be behind covers which needs to be deliberately removed before being touched.
AND everything in the whole installation connected to neutral. Like ES lamp caps, and the pins in BC lampholders. Even when a reasonable user might expect things to be off because "switched off".
 
Last edited:
Playing devil's advocate.
It's not immediately dangerous if someone doesn't stick their fingers in.

It is immediately dangerous because someone can touch a live part without a fault occurring, cover being removed etc.
The immediate danger is that a person could make contact with a live part.

An ES lamp in a holder without a big shroud will have an exposed live shell - waiting to zap people who would not expect it to be live.
Yes it will, but I don't see how that is relevant to the debate.

The debate is around the advice that reverse polarity at the incoming supply is a C1 but elsewhere in the installation is a C2.
The case of the exposed ES lamp cap would make it a C1 regardless of where the reverse polarity is in the installation.

So why isn't that immediately dangerous - it doesn't need a fault to be live. And it will still be live when switched off at the wall if it's a single pole switch.
It is immediately dangerous, I have not suggested it isn't.

I am not suggesting that a reversed polarity fault can't be immediately dangerous, I am saying that it is not always immediately dangerous.
In theory - but look at how many "discussions" we have here about coding !

Yes there are many discussions, that doesn't change the fact that the codes are clearly defined. The number of discussions, and the content of many of them, show something about the knowledge and understanding of some of the people carrying out EICRs and highlight the problems with some of the published guidance.

AND everything in the whole installation connected to neutral. Like ES lamp caps, and the pins in BC lampholders. Even when a reasonable user might expect things to be off because "switched off".

The pins in BC lamp holders are always there regardless of the polarity and are always a danger. The BC lampholder is only allowed because there is no reasonable way to get rid of it, if a lampholder with exposed pins like that was invented today it would never be allowed.
 
New posts

Reply to Pulling live meter tails from isolater switch in consumer unit in the UK Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

Similar Threads

I am planning to go semi off grid with a victron and battery system. The system will be installed in an out building about 20 meters away from...
Replies
7
Views
731
I live in a flat in Scotland supplied with an old 2 meter system called THTC where one meter using a time signal supplied heating and hot water...
Replies
7
Views
1K
Hello again, Was looking at installing yet another dedicated consumer box for my EV charger off the henley blocks and i noticed that a meter...
Replies
11
Views
2K
Was helping a friend out and changing their CU which had a date stamp from 1990. Good quality Merlin-Gerin unit and a nice job originally. They...
Replies
7
Views
813
Evening Gents just after a bit of advice and what would you do differently. I have wired up 3 kw heaters in 4mm tuff cable (40 meter distance...
Replies
2
Views
253

OFFICIAL SPONSORS

Electrical Goods - Electrical Tools - Brand Names Electrician Courses Green Electrical Goods PCB Way Electrical Goods - Electrical Tools - Brand Names Pushfit Wire Connectors Electric Underfloor Heating Electrician Courses
These Official Forum Sponsors May Provide Discounts to Regular Forum Members - If you would like to sponsor us then CLICK HERE and post a thread with who you are, and we'll send you some stats etc

Electrical Forum

Welcome to the Electrical Forum at ElectriciansForums.net. The friendliest electrical forum online. General electrical questions and answers can be found in the electrical forum.
This website was designed, optimised and is hosted by Untold Media. Operating under the name Untold Media since 2001.
Back
Top
AdBlock Detected

We get it, advertisements are annoying!

Sure, ad-blocking software does a great job at blocking ads, but it also blocks useful features of our website. For the best site experience please disable your AdBlocker.

I've Disabled AdBlock