What is this and is it normal? Council electrics

[RyanA]

It's been almost 4 years since the council updated all the electrics in the house, at the time they moved the fuse box to the back wall rather than the side wall. Today curiosity got the better of me and I'm just wondering what this is, as it doesn't look normal. At the time a council inspector looked everything over and said it was OK.

Basically wires coming through the wall where the fusebox used to be, going into this little bar with screw things on it, they just plastered over all the wires. From the little bar are more wires going into the fusebox.

What is this, and is it normal/safe?

 

[DPG]

I think its a good thing the OP has asked the question. Most people wouldn't even think about it, and would probably hang their feather dusters and wellies from the cables. Nothing wrong with your question at all - just remember as has been said above by Lee and others, it's the equipotential bonding that is the key.

 

[GB.Kayak]

Spot on mate, I remember wiring some new council homes around 30 years ago and the Clerk of Works would check the socket heights with a steel rule and measure the centre of each room to check the lights were spot on, he couldn't beat me though.

Hi Dave, ever come across one Jim Dymock in your travels?

GB

 

[David M]

Thanks that all makes sense. But in an earth fault condition, that would still become live - and would be the last connected conductive part before ground. Does that not make it potentially more dangerous to be in contact with?

Edit I appreciate that no matter what most current will still want to travel to ground, not through anyone touching it - but there is still some low level risk of making contact isn't there?

Ok, Lee has already explained this but since you are not a qualified spark I will briefly explain it to you in basic lay mans terms.

Its all about potential. basically what this means is that current will flow down the path of least resistance, the better the conductor the better the current will flow. So in a fault condition to prevent shock, if someone was unfortunate enough to come into contact with an exposed conductive part, we want to divert as much current from passing through that person as possible. The amount of current passing through the person depends (basically) on what the voltage is and what the resistance is between the person and earth and the "live" part. Hence why birds can sit on high powered supply lines and not get harmed, the resistance to earth is so high (because they are not in contact with the earth) so the current cannot flow.
Now basically what the earthing and bonding do in an electrical installation is to make all exposed & extraneous conductive parts at an equal potential and the path to earth as least resistive as possible (there is a bit more to it than that but we won't go into the details). So even during a direct fault where the current flowing through the earth conductor is high, directly touching it (depending on a few factors) will not give you a harmful shock because the current will mainly flow through the path of least resistance (the earth conductor).
In addition there are protection devices - fuses, mcbs, rcd... in place so that if this fault was to arise then the supply would be cut very quickly so the high fault current would only pass through the conductor for a very brief moment.

All this is basically what Lee mentioned and is commonly termed as - ADS.

Hope this explains it for you.

 

[David M]

Thanks that all makes sense. But in an earth fault condition, that would still become live - and would be the last connected conductive part before ground. Does that not make it potentially more dangerous to be in contact with?

Edit I appreciate that no matter what most current will still want to travel to ground, not through anyone touching it - but there is still some low level risk of making contact isn't there?

Ok, Lee has already explained this but since you are not a qualified spark I will briefly explain it to you in basic lay mans terms.

Its all about potential.
Basically what this means is that current will flow down the path of least resistance, the better the conductor the better the current will flow. So in a fault condition to prevent shock, if someone was unfortunate enough to come into contact with an exposed conductive part, we want to divert as much current from passing through that person as possible. The amount of current passing through the person depends (basically) on what the voltage is and what the resistance is between the live part, person and earth. Hence why birds can sit on high powered supply lines and not get harmed, the resistance to earth is so high (because they are not in contact with the earth) the current cannot easily flow.
Now basically what the earthing and bonding do in an electrical installation is to make all exposed & extraneous conductive parts at an equal potential and the path to earth as least resistive as possible (there is a bit more to it than that but we won't go into the details). So even during a direct fault where the current flowing through the earth conductor is high, directly touching it (depending on a few factors) will not give you a harmful shock because the current will mainly flow through the path of least resistance (the earth conductor).
In addition there are protection devices - fuses, mcbs, rcds... in place so that if a fault was to arise they are designed to cut the supply very quickly so the fault current would only pass through the earth conductor for a very brief moment. In other words its extremely unlikely that anyone would be in contact with the earth conductor, or in the case of the OP connection point, plus creating a lower resistance to earth, for the brief moment a fault current was being conducted.

All this is basically what Lee mentioned and is commonly termed as - ADS.

And for you trainees out there - all this is why it is very important that during your installs and testing that you ensure that all the earthing & bonding is present and correct. It is the most important thing to consider for an electrical installation!

Hope this explains it for you.

 

[Pete E]

why are people complaining about the state of the electrics when people living ruff on the streets .bugs me

Really? So you can do work "as rough as" and if a customer complains, you just tell them your lucky not to be living on the streets?

Step daughter moved into a council property and it was terrible the state she was expected to live in..They had supposedly carried out renovation and the work was supposedly inspected, but the guy must have been blind..Luckily myself and her father were able to make things decent and advise her what she need to chase the council about re sub standard work on the electrics plumbing plus safety issues re the garden fencing...