British Gas- bad earth

[atm84]

So my mother in law has had BG round to service the boiler and as part of the service they now carry out a check on the earthing.

My mother in law informed me that the BG engineer went round the sockets in the house with a meter and wasn't getting a earth reading at the sockets.

I've gone round and believe it or not there does not appear to be a main earth at the consumer unit. There just appears a live and neutral.

I've got a socket tester and plugged it into a number of sockets and all three lights lit up and sounded to say that live, neutral and earth is present. Obviously I know this is not a reliable way to test for an earth but just trying to explain.

Now I cannot believe that there is no earth to the house. A large extension was built in 2002 and surely something would have been picked up then.

There is no bonding to the gas or the water other than cross bonding between the hot and cold pipes at the sink.

Ill upload some photos in a bit.

 

[atm84]

Went to 'Go Advanced' button next to 'Post Quick Reply' and uploaded from there. cheers

 

[atm84]

Is that it far rhs. Not sure. Might just be a block. ?

Yes just two blocks. One for neutral, one for live. There appears to be no incoming head or main fuse. Other side of the wall is the neighbours house.

 

[Octopus]

You do need to call in a spark with a MFT. You say Suffolk - its a big county - can you be more specific?

 

[atm84]

Mildenhall

 

[SPARTYKUS]

Yes just two blocks. One for neutral, one for live. There appears to be no incoming head or main fuse. Other side of the wall is the neighbours house.

Sounds like snowheads take.

 

[atm84]

What did you do. Did you get the DNO in to sort it out. Would it be the DNO's job to provide an earth if there wasn't one. I know years ago did DNO wasn't required to.

 

[trev]

TTs are not just found out in the sticks. We live near a major road into a fairly large town and we're on a TT.
If you remove the turny thing on that block on the right hand side of the pic you will probably find a fuse in there.

 

[Jay Sparks]

If it is a TT arrangement then its up to the owner to provide an earth via a rod or two. If its TN S or TN C S then the DNO have to maintain it. You need to ring them to find this out. You may also want to locate the main fuse as it looks like the tails come from behind the wooden board.

Jay

 

[terminator]

That looks like an old 2 way Henley block to me? Have you traced the red incoming tail that disappears behind the board? It must have an Supply fuse? I am in Suffolk but a hell of a long way from you!

 

[SPARTYKUS]

I bet it just comes straight off the neighbours supply.

 

[Jay Sparks]

It looks like they have used brown insulated tail for the neutral and black for the live...not that it matters much but could be confusing to a Electrical Trainee


Jay

 

[atm84]

Can't see where the tails go to. May know more after the mother in law has spoken to the neighbour. I'm assuming that its a TT system. Would I just need the meter number to find out the type of earthing arrangement from the DNO?

 

[atm84]

It looks like they have used brown insulated tail for the neutral and black for the live...not that it matters much but could be confusing to a Electrical Trainee


Jay

Its appears so Jay

 

[snowhead]

What did you do. Did you get the DNO in to sort it out. Would it be the DNO's job to provide an earth if there wasn't one. I know years ago did DNO wasn't required to.

I knocked the wall down and got 1 of the meters removed, I'd bought the 2 with the intentions of making 1 larger property.

Earth stayed clamped to the lead water main (1978)

Re you problem, the external earth wire is either an old GPO /BT Shared service / Party line earth or it's going to (or maybe rotted away) the Water stop tap under the cover with "W" on it

 

[Geordie Spark]

It looks like they have used brown insulated tail for the neutral and black for the live...not that it matters much but could be confusing to a Electrical Trainee


Jay

Walking and talking at the same time is confusing to a Electrical Trainee.