Tell us about your faults!

[chrisjacob]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

This is a very common fault which often occurs in our houses- plug falls out of the receptacle. This fault due to the losing grip and worn contacts in receptacle. The solution for it is to replace the old receptacle with a new one.

 

[Bobster]

The camera may well just be pointing at the door way.

In which case it's fine.

 

[ayjay]

its a 360 degree camera though rob

 

[Edd]

posted in the arms then rembered this thread.....

So sent to property, small bedsit, to carry out EICR after new tenant moved in. first thing she poins out is that the twin socket in the lounge must be kept on for the kitchen to work!!!
Ok I entertain the idea, nothings pluged in the normal twin socket, and as im starting to explain that the switch will only break whats ever pluged in she switches it off! and I watch the boiler and fridge die!!!!!!!!!!!!!

She switches the socket back on and the power to fridge and boiler comes back up.....


Im looking at it and I lean down and do the same. I have to admit I was gob smacked, a normal switched twin socket with nothing pluged in that kills the kitchen as soon as you switch it off.........


Ok it didnt take long to find the fault but if someone phoned up with such a fault you would bet your life they were lieing.


Turned out that there was no Ring continuity, and switching the socket on and off moved the brass conection at the back of the socket just enought to make and break the live conections.
Just shows the kind of random stuff that can cause a fault.

ohh the ring cont problem was a proper loose/ hanging out conection at the other side of the kitchen.....​

 

[electricianant]

went to install some emergency lights in a small meeting hall today. There was a convenient pull chord near by double pole, so happily connected. All was going well until i came to screw it up and finish when the thing went bang. Thought the usual that somehow it s/c to earth or something, so tried again. Same thing. Since by this time I was running out of length on cable to do anymore connections I spent the day checking the circuit and connections and everything I could think of. The client came at the end of the day and saw me investigating and said the last electrician had to put cardboard between the connections and the earth terminal as they touch as you screw it up. SWAP THE THING IF FAULTY. Annoying to say the least. normally the first thing I check but since it worked perfectly when i attended i didn't think anything of it

 

[C&H]

now i'm not one for nit-picking but.......
cable management could be improved slightly me-thinks, orange cable is 3.3kv, blue pipes are water
Zs at the dist board is 3.94 ohms
and last but not least, if you haven't got an mcb just stick a main switch in!

p.s. anyone know the max zs for the main switch to meet disconnection times?!

 

[Matth]

I got a call to one of my customers mothers house who had just had a new kitchen fitted, and now her shower didnt work.

All MCB's in the on position.............the breaker for the shower had actually been installed upside down, so when it was what she thought was the on position, it was actually off !! I dont know why the fitters were in her consumer unit, or why they turned her breaker upside down !!

 

[Tiny Spark]

I got asked to look at a guys new cooker which would not turn on.
Opened the top up and tested it to find the neutral had dissapeared for some reason.
Went back to the cooker switch took the cover off and the insides of the switch kind of sprung out!
So after working out how this prehistoric dinosaur of a switch went together and finding out this had happened to the guy who installed it I worked out part of the neutral link was missing!
Client replies "Oh yeah I found that and wondered what it was" he then proceeds to pull it out of his tat draw!

Put it back in and fault rectified.

 

[dan86]

I got a call to one of my customers mothers house who had just had a new kitchen fitted, and now her shower didnt work.

All MCB's in the on position.............the breaker for the shower had actually been installed upside down, so when it was what she thought was the on position, it was actually off !! I dont know why the fitters were in her consumer unit, or why they turned her breaker upside down !!

just a call out charge for that then?!

 

[murrayjones11]

I snore loudly

 

[Kate]

I snore loudly

What?!?! That made me chuckle with how random it was!!

 

[Silly Sausage]

I post on internet forums.

 

[dan86]

is that you're 'fault' Archy?!

 

[sajeel]

Mouse in db unit

 

[Chris sparky]

Nice!
I've found one of the critters in an old db before

I guess he forgot to..."miceolate" the supply before entering.


I'm sorry. Coat please

 

[Matth]

just a call out charge for that then?!

LOL, I had some other things to do, so I didnt charge them..............thats how nice I am !!

 

[Rampantchilli]

Ok so I went to an emergency call as the tenant had stated she was getting a shock from the shower. My employer doesn't really give much time for this kind of work, and doesn't pay OT, so arrived at 3.30. Carried out the normal tests on the shower circuit and found nothing wrong. Apparently this lady had had 3 shocks, the last one she said to herself I'd better be quick and carried on, lol
so I isolated the shower, and returned the next day.
all IR readings were good, well over 100M, except for upstairs lighting, which was incorrectly labelled as smoke detectors, the IR reading was .86m at 230v. Lighting was not Rcd protected, but shower, sockets and cooker were.
all circuits in the bathroom were bonded as per 16th
carried out a full EICR, and found the only one fault, the bathroom 16w 2d fitting was connected wrong, across L-E, I'm guessing that the shock was caused by the light fitting, passing current down the earth to the pipe work then on through the water and once the drains were wet, the lady got a small shock.
I reconnected the light, obviously, and did additional supp bonding in bathroom and to shower circuit,. The tenant hasn't had another shock since.

 

[Anthony King]

This was quite a good one today, rcd tripping, damp in the walls had just destroyed the back box and the cables in the wall, thats all that was left of it

 

[ash_s3]

Just nick an extra switched line out of the 3 core for some wall lights!

 

[KAS1]

Is that the cpc with red sleeving also I'd of thought they would of used a wago lol

 

[ash_s3]

Yea, used the cpc as a switched line just on the switch drop! Used red sleeving at both ends, cpc wasn't exposed like it shows in the pic I ripped it open a bit, as at first it looked like 4 core cable!

 

[rich.250]

Found this lovely 16mm t+e under customers crap in a loft. Live, off as 80 amp bs 88. What you can't see in the pic is the tape doesn't even cover the end of the copper!!

 

[sajeel]

View attachment 20205

Found this lovely 16mm t+e under customers crap in a loft. Live, off as 80 amp bs 88. What you can't see in the pic is the tape doesn't even cover the end of the copper!!

Oh dear

 

[pennywise]

Found in a nursery

 

[Franklopes]

I got called to a house to rectify a cooker circuit that had tripped and stopped working. Traced the fault all the way back to inside to cooker only to find an electrocuted mouse between live and earth.........nice!

 

[HandySparks]

Found in nursery

So are all the final circuits wired with blue for line and brown for neutral? Which way round were the accessories connected?

 

[pennywise]

Everything is wired back to front at every point lighting and power, so nothing has been tripping, also if you look closely at the lighting they're on a 32amp breaker lol

 

[sajeel]

View attachment 20378

Found in nursery

Colorblind lol

 

[telectrix]

told 'em we should have stuck to red and black.

 

[telectrix]

only a lunatic would pick the natural colour of earth for live conductors.

 

[Tiny Spark]

View attachment 20378

Found in nursery

Now thats impressive!!
For all the wrong reasons lol

 

[willy fixit]

Needed to disconnect garage supply for building works prior to the gas man coming to re-route the gas pipe... return to find gas pipe re-routed and the old pipe disconnected both ends but a bit still hanging out the wall. Bonding still connected to the old pipe!
I wonder how long it would have remained that way had I not been returning to re-instate the garage supply?

 

[chcnorris29]

View attachment 20378Found in a nursery

32 amp lighting... Nice... (Sarcastic).Love the blue phases and brown neutrals. However did this needs to be banned from electrics.I knew that live was brown (red) and neutral was blue (black) even before I started to really become interested in electrics.

 

[ayjay]

couldn,t the blues just be sleeved in brown? and the browns in blooo?-- bloooobydy doo
the ceiling roses could be topsy tervy
sockets back the front

 

[chcnorris29]

View attachment 14797Neat job :biggrin5:

love the earthing you got there. Very safe with no gapes in the board.Don't see any issue. (Sarcastic before you ask).Thanks

 

[chcnorris29]

couldn,t the blues just be sleeved in brown? and the browns in blooo?-- bloooobydy doothe ceiling roses could be topsy tervysockets back the front

Why bother, have to disconnect to put it on then reconnect, may as well redo correctly.

 

[Tiny Spark]

Cant see any problems there Hubsy.... :s
Oh other than the missing fuse out of the plug top.
Wont work without that, silly people!!

Seriously some things begger belief!

 

[chcnorris29]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

found this in a suspended ceiling today. the pics are far from the best as they are off the phone. all the cpc`s were wired outside the jb well it`s original if nothing else. 5 or 6 live cables chopped and left coming out the ends of it one 20 foot away form the jb. the socket was one of the ones that were still wired into it, on .75mm. another quality instal by bodjit and run

Lack of space in a JB. Means people can do some really neat jobs. (Ye sarcastic).

 

[chcnorris29]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

How about this for a neat and tidy job!

Wheres the problem...

 

[epicelectrical]

Just had one still unresolved.......
got called out to a house this evening with 'nuisance tripping' of RCD. Got there and noticed there was a 30mA RCD before the C/U and also one as the main switch on the C/U (no distinction between RCD's)
i then did a ramp test on RCD and neither tripped. I went at x5 on 30mA and nothing. I then kept going up as far as 1000mA and still wouldn't trip. I put an earth leakage tester on and went straight to OL on 400mA range. I took out the first RCD and replaced it with a Henley block hoping something might be better but the RCD M/S was still tripping completely randomly when not under test conditions. I started looking at circuits. I noticed that the downstairs sockets had <80mA of residual so unplugged everything from the circuit and still had <40mA of residual under no load. I took off a selection of faceplates and behind one was a parallel ring (4 of each conductor in the terminals behind double socket, two old and 2 harmonised!) the shower cover was already off, a seemingly 'in use' socket in lounge with now power at it but conductors behind. a halogen hob off an FCU from ring final and a 2KW cooker from 32A 6mm radial (not other way around as youd expect) the o/s light switch was taped to off position and another circuit in the C/U said 'ring old and new' with 4 line conductors in one 3871! The house is rented and couldn't get hold of the landlord to get consent or assurance of payment to start lifting floors, taking more time or chopping holes in flat roof area above dreaded kitchen etc etc. I think I will have to suggest an RCBO setup to the landlord with the scope of partial reword and see what else I find? Anyhow, has anyone come across an RCD that will not trip under test, will carry over what it's rated at, but will trip randomly with no extra load being added? I think it could be lots of things such as loose connections on a JB, water ingress through flat roof or maybe VIR lurking under the floor that the previous slippery spark may have neglected to be move and instead join fresh twin on 'visible areas'?

 

[sajeel]

love the earthing you got there. Very safe with no gapes in the board.Don't see any issue. (Sarcastic before you ask).Thanks

Dell boy bodges are us

 

[Andrewr3]

Yesterdays domestic fault was a short between live and earth on a length of T&E. Caused by a fridge freezer being pushed into position and crushing the cable between a freezer foot and the floor. The cable was loose on the floor near the wall because the cable installer (kitchen fitter) had not clipped or secured the cables back to the wall or enclosed them. Also found at the same time the old ring main extension joints into to new kitchen were hidden behind a fitted cupboard unit where the joints were simply blue barrel crimps wrapped in sticky tape without a enclosure. Also noted that two of the kitchen sockets were fitted directly onto the kitchen units (not the wall), which I seem to recall this should not have been done.

 

[Poptasticdave]

Also noted that two of the kitchen sockets were fitted directly onto the kitchen units (not the wall), which I seem to recall this should not have been done.

I've come across this many times, and not just in kitchen cupboards but also fitted study furniture and fitted wardrobes. I was always under the impression that it was wrong (though I seem to think that, at least back in 15th ed days when I was fully reg'd and working, it was not actually against the reg's, just not recommended - could be wrong, it's a long time back). However, I was quite surprised recently when I was bemoaning the fitting of a double 13A socket and two Fused Spurs to the inside of a kitchen unit, right under the cold stop tap - which was leaking slightly - and a fully qual'd and reg'd spark, of 40+ year's experience, who I've always trusted, said it was absolutely fine and other than siting them right under the stop cock he couldn't see anything contravening reg's.
Be interesting to see what other folk on here think - and no, I've not bothered to get out my 17th ed book and check, so I do accept I may be completely wrong.

 

[Engineer54]

I'm with you on this, i don't and never have, installed socket outlets to kitchen cabinets. As far as i'm concerned it's bad practice, and can cause more problems than it's worth in the long term!!

 

[davethsparky]

I'm with you on this, i don't and never have, installed socket outlets to kitchen cabinets. As far as i'm concerned it's bad practice, and can cause more problems than it's worth in the long term!!

How do you fit sockets etc in island units without fixing to the cabinets?

 

[Poptasticdave]

How do you fit sockets etc in island units without fixing to the cabinets?

Hmm....that's a good point!

 

[willy fixit]

I agree, it's defo better to fit accessories to the structure of the building - as far as I remember though it's not a reg. just a recommendation in the Guide to Building Regs - I'm sure someone will find it soon and correct or confirm!

 

[Engineer54]

How do you fit sockets etc in island units without fixing to the cabinets?

With great difficulty i would imagine!! lol!!

 

[nickblake]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

doing remedial works on a house all insulation reading were over 200 meg , then installing an earth bond I moved a heating pipe and touched a screw and bang , the screw holding the heating trunking to the wall went straight through the live of the immersion heater cable and nothing else just goes to show you can still get a fault even though you have tested and all appears fine !

 

[bawall]

Had a call from a local cafe " our power keeps tripping and we have to keep resetting it but now the button is in but there is still no power" here is what I found



Food warmer, hotplate, kettle, toaster, fryer, Large coffee machine and a fridge all fed of the one 30A circuit wonder how it lasted as long as it has now has a new board and split in to 3 new rings and all the old melted chock block joints removed