Building Regulatiosn Part P

[John Armstrong]

One thing to watch for there, is that I think a change to the colour coding of the cable is also on the cards at around the same time, so might be an idea to stock up on T+E cable.

[Al Reynolds]

I know of someone who moved an electric shower and extended the cabling with chocolate block and 1mm² flex. At the time they thought it was odd that: (a) the wires were different sizes (b) one had strands but the other was solid (c) the colours were different but at no time did they consider looking up whether this was correct or asking someone who might know what should be done. The cable failed when the next person took a shower. When they opened it up they found that the chocolate block hat mostly melted and there was very little of the flex left. They then called an electrician.

I'm not sure whether Part P will make any difference at all to situations like this, unless there is a big campaign to raise awareness that electrical work comes under building regulations. How many people on the street know that you need building regs if you replace a window?

Just my 2 pence, Al

[Al Reynolds]

Hopefully they'll get the timing wrong and change the colours about three months before the new regs come in. That way we'll all be able to use the new-colour cable and claim we did all our electrical work back in a three-month period early in the 21st of the century!*

Al

• unless they start printing the date on cable

[Tim]

You do?

Sounds like more b***ox to me.

Must remember to forget I read that just now ;->

On an aside, are the governemnet deliberately trying to bring building regs into such a laughable state of disrepute that eventually everyone ignores *all* the regs? This seems a worrying state of affairs.

I always thought that building regs were like IEE regs - eminently sensible and applied to doing things that if they went wrong, could have dire consequences (like house falling on head after pulling out load bearing wall).

Now we're getting into the situation where I'm going to be running a checklist on a major project (DIY - I don't do this stuff for a living) along the likes of:

1) Electrics - consult IEE regs, sod telling the council; 2) New window - can I screw it in so it won't fall out? Then sod council 3) Drywalling - are there fire escape considerations - get opinion 3) Structural alteration - hmm, I'll do that by the book...

What a stupid state of affairs.

Timbo

[PoP]

Beer. I like that idea.... ;)

PoP

Sending email to my published email address isn't guaranteed to reach me.

[PoP]

Well I didn't until someone mentioned it a while back, and I think I would be reasonably expected to have an idea.

PoP

Sending email to my published email address isn't guaranteed to reach me.

[Huge]

London meet, anyone?

[James]

My insurance requires me to maintain my property in good condition, but nowhere does it say anything about having it **certified** to conform to building regulations. If insurance companies wanted to ensure safe electrical installations it would make more sense for them to insist upon periodic 5 year inspections as suggested by the wiring regulations.

Taking the analogy of car insurance - is my insurance invalid if my brakes fail after I have changed the brake pads?

James

[Andy Hall]

Definitely. Do you want to organise it? I did the last one, aided and prompted by John Schmitt.

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

[Huge]

Aaaeeeiiiii!!!!!

I've done several uk.misc ones.

Oh, alright, then.

More later.

[Andy Wade]

That's meant as an "or".

Yes, that's correct. (To the extent that these are only proposals and the legislation hasn't been published yet.) There was also mention, in one of the documents on the ODPM website, that _all_ work done by non-competent persons in kitchens would be notifiable (in view of the amount of inept electrical work done by kitchen fitters).

It's all very silly. Minor works exemptions will encourage over-extending of existing circuits in situations where it would be safer to provide a new circuit. Also look at Item 6 & note 2: "where can I get a 100yd. reel of

7/0.029 TRS to do the like-for-like replacement encouraged by this particular exemption?"

[Parish]

Thanks for the clarification. It was items 4 & 5 about bonding, especially testing it, that prompted my question. I would have thought (based, in part, on discussions in this group) that this would be something that required an expert to get right since, if you get it wrong, you may only realize your mistake in the last few milli-seconds of life!

[Andy Luckman (AJL Electronics)]

Obviously not if they can't spell "sustificate" :-)

[River Tramp]

Isn't Part Q up next, Broadband Access?

How that is going to help health and safety, or energy conservation, I'm not sure.

RT

[John Stumbles]

Make it West-ish London and you could twist my arm :-)

[G&M]

It is - but the number of house sales falling through for lack of them is steadily increasing.

[Tim S]

Thou doth jest, surely?

Timbo

[Andy Hall]

Because you will be able to work from home all the time in your superinsulated house and not need to drive to work.

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

[Dean]

In what way do building regs affect replacing a window? I'm having my existing double glazing units removed and replaced with new double glazing units (so as to match the double glazing units in an extension were having built). Do I need building regs approval for this, or is it replacing original single glazing with double glazing that falls foul of the building regs?

IMHO Extending building regs to DIY activities, such as installing a bit of new wiring, broadband access and the like is about par for the course for socialist governments like we have at the moment. If you want less government interference in your life, vote Conservative. If you want more govenrment interference in your life, vote Labour/Lib Dem.

Dean.

[usenet]

You do need approval because the new double glazing units have to conform the the latest insulation requirements (well the windows as a whole do I think).