Tell us about your faults!

[kung]

Hi ALL
Just thought id put this one up for all those faults we find.
heres one to kick it off !
Domestic RCD tripped and wouldnt reset cause was a blown low energy light bulb.
There you go now for yours !

 

[Jurassic Sparks]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

But let's face it, it's not apprenticeship material we're talking here, it's primary school science!

Simon.

yes Simon, thats what is worrying me
this bloke is installing central heating systems as well!
but it does take a bit of experience to learn about correct methods of installation
I have seen a few people that have taken these re training and part P course
they sail through the exams and stuff ( I found them hard even for an old sparkie) and then they do very odd things
recent finds on a new installation
1. roof joists drilled for cables / the joists are thin and there is plenty of room to run the cables along the purlins then 90 deg along the joists
2.partial rewire and new C/U found 3 old single gang sockets on wooden pattresses, the client complained the sparked if you walked near them when anything was plugged in
3.BS clamp on incoming sheath of company supply cabel ( old as well)
4. ring and lighting circuit cables zip tied to a gas pipe
5. new C/U fitted with a gas main pipe 28mm running against it and through the tails
6.threaded rod used as earth electrode???
7.external commando socket fitted for a pool, but it was an internal socket and no gland or sheath
8. SWA entering a 2 way consumer unit, the sheathing was not earthed, not glands fitted and the method of entry to the C/U was stunning, I will try and post a picture

 

[Jurassic Sparks]

Re: Tell us about your faults !



total and utter muppetry
I only went to the house to check an outside light and examined the whole system
I will post anotehr pic of the other end of this cable
ps the garage roof was leaking so I have pinned a notice on the building do not use any electrical appliance here, and severed the supply in the house
I am going back next month to demolish the garage as we found rats nesting and its beyond repair, plus she hates it and it blocks the view
so 5 weeks work for an outsid light not bad!!

 

[Giovanni]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

yes Simon, thats what is worrying me
this bloke is installing central heating systems as well!
but it does take a bit of experience to learn about correct methods of installation
I have seen a few people that have taken these re training and part P course
they sail through the exams and stuff ( I found them hard even for an old sparkie) and then they do very odd things
recent finds on a new installation
1. roof joists drilled for cables / the joists are thin and there is plenty of room to run the cables along the purlins then 90 deg along the joists
2.partial rewire and new C/U found 3 old single gang sockets on wooden pattresses, the client complained the sparked if you walked near them when anything was plugged in
3.BS clamp on incoming sheath of company supply cabel ( old as well)
4. ring and lighting circuit cables zip tied to a gas pipe
5. new C/U fitted with a gas main pipe 28mm running against it and through the tails
6.threaded rod used as earth electrode???
7.external commando socket fitted for a pool, but it was an internal socket and no gland or sheath
8. SWA entering a 2 way consumer unit, the sheathing was not earthed, not glands fitted and the method of entry to the C/U was stunning, I will try and post a picture

How do you know the guy that carried out the work didn't do a 'proper apprenticeship'......I have worked with both, time served and more recently 'fast-trackers, and in all honesty I can hold my hands up and say the fast-tracker was streets ahead of the time served, as I always say, it's about the individual, there are good and bad in both.....I am sure you have also been on jobs as I have and picked up after a 'time served' jack --- has been in an bodged it up, I did one last week, a 16th edition 'retired' spark had done a complete re-wire for the couple about to sell their house.....and supplied test results....They thought they were covered, to top that one week after the install all the kitchen sockets stopped working............A time served, 30 years under my belt, old time spark....I rest my case your honour. Rant over ;-)

 

[Jurassic Sparks]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

yes you are right
I have seen some tradesman who did a full course and learnt nowt
you cant educate pork as my old boss said??
he also said some people aint got the sense god gave a chicken
we had one employee called jobber he took loads of different course over the years and usually gained 100 percent in them
but I would trust him about as far as I would trust a dwarf to throw a piano
some day I shall tell you about his antics

 

[Mr.Si]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

I've finally gotten around to investigating a bit of my new house and found a few minor* faults

1. Spot the fault!




2. Now, I know CPCs are all joined together at the CU, but when they're separate radials for electric heaters and bonded together, surely that's bad practise!




3. These wires were just randomly left in from when the previous electrical heating system was de-commissioned... well, at least that's what I thought:






It turns out that one of them was disconnected at both ends and just laying freely in the ceiling of the ground floor kitchen. So when I was pulling on it, it just kept coming and coming and well, it just fell out:




I decided to investigate, from the main consumer unit, which circuit was which so in pulling the fuses, found that the yellow 20 amp circuit was for a decommissioned immersion heater, which is long gone but the circuit was still live and in a switch plate, screwed in to a double gang metal back-box shared with another switch, which was for one of the electrical heaters that are no longer used either (this circuit was not live).
Then It came time for pulling the fuse for one of the 30A circuits... Oh, I didn't think that was supposed to happen...: !






Now, these are probably all boring faults to you, but they amused me.
I'm looking forward to re-wiring my house once we're married and have the money to do so.

My Main earths and bondings are little on the small side too:





*In my view, all faults are potentially serious, but you know what I mean.

 

[Jurassic Sparks]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

I went to s ahouse today, rewired to ago to 16th
turned off the mcb marked downstairs showers
tested it still live?
turned off the MCb marked cooker and the shower was safe
god help a home owner if they failed to test it
then I checked the lights up and down reversed
and the 2 rings reversed?
why do some people bother to get out of bed in the morning?

 

[Mr.Si]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Cooker circuit - speaks volumes for Rewirables "protecting" 6mm2 cable...

 

[Konrad]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Something from the field.

1. The pub


2. Take away restaurant

 

[ringer]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Are you sure that's a takeaway? Where is all the grease you usually find on every surface?

 

[Martin Bradley]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

i was asked to remove and relocate all this in one night, but to maintain lighting LMAO left photo is 1 end the right is the other end, distance between ends erm about 15M, then relocate circuits in new not yet fitted containment, they had no circuit schedule so all needed to be tested, and circuits to be traced as to what was what, well well i said, then told them have a nice night.
the box had also been started by who? as it was cut.

 

[Konrad]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Main bonding conductor after periodic inspection - continuity test. Left for several months not connected.


All about installation of o/s light


and something about IP codes for this light:


Both cases are effects of works "carried out" by "professional" electricians hired by big company.

 

[Ohmyword]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

View attachment 3705

total and utter muppetry
I only went to the house to check an outside light and examined the whole system
I will post anotehr pic of the other end of this cable
ps the garage roof was leaking so I have pinned a notice on the building do not use any electrical appliance here, and severed the supply in the house
I am going back next month to demolish the garage as we found rats nesting and its beyond repair, plus she hates it and it blocks the view
so 5 weeks work for an outsid light not bad!!

I'm 'one of those' - "been in the trade 40+ years" and I can't remember ever seeing a Wylex unit with cables entering the front cover by that method before.
I wish we had had the technology (photographs on your mob. phone) like we have today, back through my career in the trade.
I explained to people that "I am never surprised anymore by what I uncover" because I think I have witnessed most things in my time.

Just recently doing a consumer unit upgrade I found out (the hard way) that the diy builder (owner of said property) had inadvertently joined two existing lighting circuits together (in a ring main).
Each circuit feed was connected to a separate 5A. fuse way. When you pulled one fuse............

Need I say more?

God save us!

 

[madmatt]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Hey all, had an annoying fault today which has occurred apparently out of the blue...some display cabinet / shelf efforts with a mix of fluorescent back lighting behind white perspex sheets and some overhead 12V halogen G6.35's capsule lamps have gone out randomly upon stripping the shelves and cabinets etc.. I found a few j.b.'s and eventually a couple of pvc's one t & e which fed in from opposite side of shop cabinets not yet stripped but weird readings on my meter of @ joint box .. Live to Earth = 237 V, Neutral to Earth 238V also and Live to Neutral 0V with switch in on position... then I go tracing back to mains in on a luminaire male / female plug socket affair and readings there were ... Live to earth 240V, Live to Neutral 17V and Neutral to Earth of 67V ! I am thinking I have an issue along a neutral somewhere ? anybody else had anything along these lines of strange voltages ??

 

[ringer]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

Sounds very much like a disconnected/floating neutral. But this post would be better placed, and answered, in its own thread. This thread is intended for those 'I can't believe what I have just found that some numpty of an installer has done and that I just had to fix' type of faults.

 

[pennywise]

Re: Tell us about your faults !

bloke said he had it rewired, apparently earths must be for just stripping the cable then lol