House lights, 10 volts with light switch off..?

[Lyonspride]

'

Truth be told, knowing what I know now, I would have used those 'maintenance free' connectors as I am a little worried about the screw down terminals working free over time.

 

I have to say I prefer to use terminal blocks inside a blank pattress box or switch enclosure, it's not the officially correct way, but the way those grub screws work in JBs, they tend to "pop" right out if you over tighten or they crack and render themselves useless. They don't fill me with confidence at all, they're an archaic design and IMO a liability.

 

As a result ive got a carrier bag full of terminal blocks of different current ratings.

 

Hell, a lot of cookers are wired using those terminal blocks inside a pattress box and short of a power shower that's the highest rated appliance in the home.

[Yanto]

so we could get anything between 216V and 253V ......... bl**** hell!

 

I know where i worked they used to insist on 230V +/- 3 %, this from normal supply grid, then stepped down to 115V then it was regulated, - we were using predominantly US equipment, some of which was very dependent upon a stable supply

 

When we were told of potential voltage anomalies we went straight over to generators, and i'm talking up to 8 generators each the size of 3 bedroom house in a huge building.

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

got one client whose property is within direct site of the main generating station, probably only three or four miles away, they regularly run at a gnats over 250 Volts, (it causes havoc with lots of stuff). But to every complaint, he gets a straight response of "within spec". We've even had logging gear in on the phases checking to see if there could be some other problem, or a combination of things. But no, just "high" Voltage!

[IanG1]

Bit late now but JB's everywhere is a big headdache as far as future fault finding is concerned. Loop in method far superior and all your conections are easily accessed and number kept to a minimum. Everywhere you break a cable and add a joint to have another potential fault in the future.

Depending on the extent of the works you are doing, some may fall under the requirement to notify under part p of the building regs?

[Darrell O'Neill]

[Darrell O'Neill]

[corsechris]

Whoever did the rubber to PVC job on my house was a bit random - got a mix of JBs and loop all over the shop. All perfectly acceptable the way they did it, but a bit of a mare for faultfinding.

 

You're right Darrell, those Wago things don't inspire confidence do they....

 

20 years in the trade? Pah, young whippersnapper, been at mine 35 now  

[Darrell O'Neill]

Yeh, but I'm only 24 yrs old chris ☺️

[corsechris]

[John K]

... 20 years in the trade? Pah, young whippersnapper, been at mine 35 now  

Did they have electrikery that long ago..? Thought it was all steam back in the day...

As to the whole Part P aspect, I'm going to "plead the 5th" and I can feel all the Sparks rolling their eyes at this, but I "think" I know enough about what is important to be safe over and the high level important stuff to do what I am doing.

I would hope that the very fact I'm worried about standardising on JB for lighting (even if it isn't the best, but at least it's consistent), screw JBs possibly coming loose, soldering or crimping, getting my earth tested, that I've drawn diagrams, all my termination have swan necks on the cores and that all my cables have maintenance loops on them, means I'm not a total diddy who thinks the cold water main is a suitable substitute for a ring main...

I'm going to do my very best to keep everything safe and shipshape whilst living in the house and come selling, I will deal with it at the time, even if I have to drop to take into account the paper work isn't all in place.

Again apologies to all the pro Sparks who are cursing me blind right now...

[Lyonspride]

^^ With the mess my house was in when I bought it, if I hadn't done the work myself it'd have cost me thousands to get fixed.

 

I did my 16th edition in 1996(ish).

 

Part P is a concern though, because I did so much work before I even knew it existed.

 

From what I can make out it's a complete con anyway, every tom/dick/harry doing a 5 day course and then calling themselves electricians, whilst the qualified and experienced guys are losing out on work, having spent thousands on qualifications (C&G etc) that are no longer apparently relevant.

[corsechris]

I'm not an electrician, although I worked with one many years ago (they called it magic back then....   ).  I don't mind changing a light switch etc but wholesale work I avoid in these days of frankly excessive regulation. Don't get me wrong, some regulation is a good thing, but like everything it seems, it's gone too far and driven people to DIY who probably shouldn't which is the exact opposite of what was intended. (Not implying you are one of those John!).

 

There is always the route of having your work checked by a qualified chap once you are done. Might cost a few quid but once it's done, you have the piece of paper for the future and the knowledge it's had a qualified (and hopefully competent!) second set of eyes over it. Ultimately, if you are confident it would pass muster, then you've done a good job. If it turns out it fails for a genuine reason, then you've learned a useful lesson and avoided a potential problem too.

 

In a similar vein, I'm doing a central heating job at home. Pulled out the old oil fired boiler and all but one rad that was nearly new, new gas fired boiler in the loft, new rads, new pressurised hot water system. Diligent reading of regulations and standards, bit of planning, bit of research, not a problem, learned a lot. Final stage is to get a qualified and certified Gas Safe chap in to assess it, test it, connect it to the gas and then certify it all for me. He gets the glory part and a fair rate for a couple of hours work and recognition of the work he has to do getting it registered with building control etc. I get the job done a fair bit cheaper and exactly as I want it with minimal disruption. The look on the chaps face when he came Saturday to have an initial recce was priceless - not unlike the expression you'd expect when someone approached an unexploded bomb! Can't blame him really - they must see some horror stories so I can understand his reticence. He seemed happy enough once he'd had a look round and asked a few questions. Fingers crossed he's still happy when he comes back next week to do the job.

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

You're lucky to find one prepared to do it!

 

I had a chat with Building Control at my local council (moved since!) about DiY fitting and commissioning of a gas boiler. She, for a woman she was, agreed that as I wasn't charging anyone for the job and (provided that) I was sufficiently competent to do it (moot point!), there was nothing actually illegal in DiY gas fitting. However I couldn't do it because a new boiler has to be certified to building regs (not gas safety) to be legal. The council would be able to do this as long as it didn't involve certifying a gas installation. She quietly suggested that I should change the hot water cylinder too and then ask for a certification of the compliance of the system to the current regs. The boiler would be inspected but only to ensure it was SEDBUK compliant but I'd be legal. An interesting way around the law - I hasten to say I didn't do it.

[corsechris]

It's not unheard of to DIY this sort of thing but I guess some guys wouldn't want to know. I did have the bloke who had installed the gas pipe for me last year all lined up, but he went funny on me after manageing to misunderstand I was doing DIY on this. Really no idea how he manage that feat TBH - I was totally up-front the whole time. Perhaps he thought I'd bottle out when I got started and he could pick up the mess and rip me off?  Dunno, but he wanted to charge me £300 for proving an estimate........

 

 There are no problems as long as i don't touch the gas and as long as I get it checked/connected by someone qualified. There's even an argument that it's OK to do the gas as well, again, as long as it's checked afterward. I didn't want to go there myself. Working with the gas doesn't worry me, I just think that would be a step too far for any qualified bloke I approached to certify it.

 

The boiler is certified SEDBUK compliant, the cylinder & boiler combination is G3 certified in a 4-pipe setup so no Part P requirement to install it which is a nice bonus. No planning implications so all good.