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]

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

You may be onto something there Snow. My bro in law seems to thinks its something to do with BT. Do you know what the shared service party line earth was used for? He thinks it goes to a disused box in the house.

Ill have to lift the W cover. Surely that can't be the earth wire and using the Water as the earth rod??? Or perhaps so?

 

[telectrix]

you've done it I can see the photos so how did you do it

when it fades that's normal. just wait a few seconds. only problem is if the pic. file size is too large.

 

[Guest111]

On the early shared service phone lines the earth was used to signal to the exchange which of the party's on the shared line required a line,without this it was possible for the other party sharing the line to listen in when a call was being made.

 

[Megavolt]

there must be a main fuse.

Telectrix

When you take a pic of r lass

 

[atm84]

Ok cheers guys. That wire does sound like it may be the redundant shared BT line earth. Hopefully will find out more from the neighbour then will get a spark in with a MFT to test the Main earthing and bonding to the gas and water.

 

[NDG Elecs]

When I have rang DNOs in the past they always say they have no records of the earthing arrangement and it is upto me to find out. This has happened on a couple of occasions only though. Next doors earthing may be completely different to yours also, so don't use that as an indication of what your earth should be.

Get a spark in to look at/test etc. New TT earth and main bonding may only cost 300 squid. Obviously that amount is variable depending on, ahem, variables!!

Money well spent in my opinion.

 

[GLENNSPARK]

She is going to ask the neighbour to see if they know where their earth is.

Its frustrating as I want to be able to provide some answers and know that's its say but I don't have the necessary tools to check or test. If it needs a rod putting in and a piece of 16mm running in and then 2 x 10mm running to the gas and water then I would be happy to do it but I'm not Part P. I take it certs would be required for earthing??

and if its a TT then why would it require a 16mm G/Y?

caus it shows it in the OSG?....lol

 

[Engineer54]

If available, get the DNO to PME the supply, and you can help out by installing the main bonding cables between the MET to the water and gas pipes!! ...There you go, All Sorted!! lol!!

Mind £269 + Vat is a real con job on the BG side of things, for what amounts to be about 15 minutes work, if they change nothing in the way of service head....

 

[GLENNSPARK]

If available, get the DNO to PME the supply, and you can help out by installing the main bonding cables between the MET to the water and gas pipes!! ...There you go, All Sorted!! lol!!

Mind £269 + Vat is a real con job on the BG side of things, for what amounts to be about 15 minutes work, if they change nothing in the way of service head....

is it?

any supplementary bonding required here?

 

[Engineer54]

Thought i read in one of the OP posts that a bit of cross bonding had been done. Seeing as the installation has those wonderful RCD thingy bobs, why would it need supplementary bonding If the main bonding is in place?? ...Or am i missing or misread something here??

 

[GLENNSPARK]

Thought i read in one of the OP posts that a bit of cross bonding had been done. Seeing as the installation has those wonderful RCD thingy bobs, why would it need supplementary bonding If the main bonding is in place?? ...Or am i missing or misread something here??

its probably my fault eng....i will just not read through threads fully before posting...lol..

 

[GLENNSPARK]

besides, if it was an RCD board...but crossbonding was already in place....still no need to remove it would there...call it an `insurance policy`....

 

[Hawkmoon]

is it?

any supplementary bonding required here?

No RCD protection to lights - cross bonding mentioned was at sink.

 

[atm84]

That's right Hawk. There is only cross bonding at the sink. No sign of main bonding from the MET to gas or water.

Ill find out from the DNO what earthing arrangement there is; get a spark with test equipment in and go from there. I'm not prepared to let my mother in law fork out any money based on a BG heating engineer walking around with a glorified plug in tester to do the earthing.

 

[snowhead]

You may be onto something there Snow. My bro in law seems to thinks its something to do with BT. Do you know what the shared service party line earth was used for? He thinks it goes to a disused box in the house.

Ill have to lift the W cover. Surely that can't be the earth wire and using the Water as the earth rod??? Or perhaps so?

Re phone;

Shared service had the same pair of cables going to each of 2 houses.
To initiate the outgoing call the earth and 1 line was used, but speech was over both lines, each house used a different line.

To receive a call, the ring voltage occoured between earth and 1 line and speech then over both lines.

Only 1 house could speak at once, but the other could listen in.

(or very similar to that as it's over 46 years since I did basic Telephony training at the GPO).

Re the water earth, yes it could