Electricians Tips from a professional electrician

[littlespark]

Electricians Tips from a professional electrician in the UK Electrical Forum

Sometimes you need to work in an old house, and there’s a number of threads on here about how to, say, fit downlights in a lathe ceiling.....

Here’s a start... on lathe and plaster walls without making a huge mess....

Mark where you want the socket to go. Height wise, measure an existing one from either the floor or the top of the skirting.


Next, use a pad saw to find a gap between the lathes. Hit and miss jabbing with the saw until it breaks through.

I will be using a regular dry lining box, so you don’t want to be too close to a vertical joist. Use the pad saw to feel to the left and right. If you can feel a joist, just adjust your planned position.

Once you have the final position, you can draw around a regular metal back box to give your cutout size.

Using a multi tool on a fairly slow speed, you can chip away at the plaster, but not the lathe quite yet.
yet.

Now, with the multi tool on a high speed and a fine toothed wood blade, you can cut neatly through the lathe without much problem. A small wood screw screwed into the middle of the lathe and held tight in pliers will help as the lathe will want to push into the hollow wall.

Now for the biggest tip I can give. Very very important whenever you are doing anything like this;



Always remember to charge your phone fully, or it will die when you’re in the middle of trying to make a hints and tips thread???

 

[telectrix]

now you got me going to open the plug on my henry what i bought for £2 at a car boot sale 12 years ago.to check it. GRRR.

 

[nicebutdim]

now you got me going to open the plug on my henry what i bought for £2 at a car boot sale 12 years ago.to check it. GRRR.

I know you've probably seen this sort of thing countless times, but I couldn't believe it. What's more is that it was part of a liquidation sale of an engineering business, who obviously would have regularly PAT tested all portable electrical equipment...

Very handy having a short flex on henry, combined with a long hose.

 

[Mike Johnson]

My twin motor 110V George is well past its sell by date, but just keeps going, I obtained it second hand over twenty years ago.

 

[casperLennon]

I’ve recently bought a battery Henry. Fantastic hoover. Much better that the previous dysons I’ve had

 

[telectrix]

dysons are crap anyway. over priced and practically unserviceable.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Not what I have found, had a battery Dyson Animal for about ten years, went wrong once and they came out within 24hrs and repaired it with no charge, the DC whatever number it is, had a dodgy inlet, found a replacement on the Internet and put it in, no problem, the other Animal we have in France had a catch fault on the dust collector again replaced by Dyson with no charge, I seem to have the extreme opposite experience to you Tel?

For a domestic environment I don't think the Dysons can be beaten, but I would imagine they would not last long in the back of a van being taken day to day on work related cleaning operations, for that, don't think you can beat a Numantic vacuum whatever the model.

 

[telectrix]

my last experience with dyson was the thing had stopped altogether due to worn carbon brushes in the motor. i contacted dyson direct, requesting a set of brushes. " sorry, sir, we can't supply brushes, but we can sell you a motor, £90 +VAT". ended up buying brushes off ebay, £2.50 free delivery.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Looked at another way, you had used your Dyson without trouble so much you wore out the brushes, I'd say that was pretty good going in this throw away era we live in.

 

[telectrix]

Looked at another way, you had used your Dyson without trouble so much you wore out the brushes, I'd say that was pretty good going in this throw away era we live in.

they'd not worn out. 1 brush was fine. the other one was stuck in it's holder and had arced to the comm. and burnt down.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Where you using it for work or home?

 

[telectrix]

was only home use.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Been using our Dyson Animal in our home for well over ten years as the only vacuum and its still going, never had to change the brush's, so we all speak as we find, you have had problems I haven't, perhaps I got two good ones and you got a bad one?

 

[littlespark]

I’ve recently bought a battery Henry. Fantastic hoover. Much better that the previous dysons I’ve had

It’s either a Henry, or a Hoover... it can’t be both.

Got a Henry in the van, just in case.

 

[Mike Johnson]

It’s either a Henry, or a Hoover... it can’t be both.

Got a Henry in the van, just in case.

No it's either a Numatic or a Hoover, if you want to be that pedantic.

 

[nicebutdim]

It's a specific brand of vacuum cleaner or a hoover. It may be either or both (although not in the case of Henry) ?