any chance of a little advice please on a lighting circiut

[angellonewolf]

can i say thanks for all the replys any help will cut down the amount of time i am playing

yes its the mcb that is tripping as its a split board and all other circuits are covered by the rcd the lighting has not got an rcd protection


my 17 th edition board is split but has 2 rcd units covering all circuits i had this done by a sparky good bloke and will call him if i have to but dont want to get told yea bud its the bla bla witch is some thing i could do my self

 

[Leesparkykent]

repeatedly resetting an mcb until you narrow down the fault isn't a good idea. A sparky worth his salt with proper test equipment could probably narrow the fault down for the price of an hours call out.

 

[telectrix]

i could operate on my booze damaged liver but i'd rather have a surgeon do it.

 

[Octopus]

Time to get my coat

 

[Darkwood]

Hi anglelonewolf, welocme to the forum.

You say you have previously got qualifications but are not a practicing electrician thus your out of touch with it I can assume, regardless of onsite experience your training will have taught you that fault finding will require basic test instruments in order to trace and identify the possible causes of a fault that you describe, as you express you do not have testing equipment then all we can advice is call in an practicing Electrician as there isn't really a lot you can do unless you by chance spot the fault on a visual inspection or can relate it to a specific area by switching the lights on one by one... If it is taking approx 10mins to trip it could be an overload issue, again you would need to calculate the loading and ask a few questions to boot.

PS check any outside lighting and detectors for water ingress - common issue as the seals breakdown, these can give delayed tripping.

 

[angellonewolf]

Yep I take to consideration all comments and know this will prob be a call out job

 

[angellonewolf]

i have had only and hour to look over the problem on a dark night i removed the out side light (by a fused isolater inside the house) as that was my first call but did not help we power all light switches off in the house and turned on the mcb again and it still went out after 4 mins he had changed a 2d light bulb 2 weeks before so was thinking that was poss a problem but removed that still the same

so said will have a think on it overnight and look in the daylight

 

[angellonewolf]

i can see yes a meter would be a great help but as the up stairs and down stairs are on the same circuit so a test would only help to prove its a insulation problem not where it to ?

 

[angellonewolf]

i dont think its overloading from new added stuff as all lighting has been in there for a long while and the power is gone down rather than up due to most of the lighting now to be led so a lot lower power apart from the ceiling fan all of the lighting is led or lower power and as said with all lights off in the house its still doing it that leads be to think its on the main loop or light switch

most of the switches and fitting are original so most are well over due for replacment

 

[Darkwood]

i can see yes a meter would be a great help but as the up stairs and down stairs are on the same circuit so a test would only help to prove its a insulation problem not where it to ?

A meter can be used to identify in some cases all the way to the fault by splitting the circuit up, I would also suggest a ammeter to check what the current is been pulled, this alone could identify a particular fitting or group of fittings. Like I expressed, your very limited to what you can do and its more luck than judgement that would see you finding the problem without test equipment in this instance.

 

[angellonewolf]

i do have a fluke multi meter for amps

 

[Paul.M]

Sounds like the MCB has tripped many, many, many times. Once you or your electrician friend has found and resolved the fault, please change the MCB for a new one.

 

[angellonewolf]

off to bed to have a sleep on it think will do a vis cheak on every thing first

then think on what to do next

thanks for the help if you have any more thoughts keep them coming will look again in the morning