Plugs

[John]

TV Aerial Amplifier in my loft. The one amp fuse is adequate and no earth is required. It is fed from my lighting circuit - as that is accessible in the loft.

[Andy Burns]

Anything like this?

[Dave Liquorice]

Even from a private seller at a car boot or over eBay?

Certainly new goods must have a fitted plug and as you say the Elfin Safety lot have effectively stopped many charity shops selling anything electrical.

[Owain]

AIUI yes.

The alternative is to remove the plug, thus making the item non-functional and describing it as a "collectable" for "decorative" purposes only.

Owain

[Samantha Booth]

I didn't know that It was from eBay. its been returned now anyway.

[Alang]

Yep. We had one of those in our house in the 50s. We had a Bakelite clock connected to it. But we had a coal fire

[Andrew Gabriel]

Yes, absolutely.

Like I said, it depends on them being able to be tested. Some charity shops find an electrician who's happy to do the odd free test for them. Other shops will get one of the staff qualified to do PAT testing. You don't need to be an electrician to do this -- the recognised C&G exam is intended to be achievable by someone who knows how wire a plug and knows the difference between milliohms and megohms (which is the bit most of the real electricians actually struggle with).

[Andrew Gabriel]

No, that's still illegal.

You have to remove at least the flex, and some people say you have to strip out other electrical parts, such as lampholders. An antique shop near me has to do that with antique lights. You get the electrical bits in a separate bag, a bit like the chicken giblets. The other option is to get them refurbished so they can be safely used and legally sold.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Yes. we had one too. The socket was a spur of the (then) ultra new 'ring main', with six 13A sockets on it It was a screw fastened plug with flex in it that went to the clock but circa 194 made of new fangled WHITE plastic. Nit the brown bakelite stuff.

Ah..the 50s. WHITE plugs, and Formica! How modern it all seemed.

[Andrew Gabriel]

have a couple of surface mount versions of those knocking around. I used to use them for feeding kitchen cupboard lighting before the Klik plugs become widespread. These take standard BS1362 plug fuses.

My parents have an older style MK BESA-box mounted one (no earth) in their living room, which is used for the Christmas tree lights each year. That takes the smaller sized clock fuse which came in 0.5A, 1A, 2A versions (similar but not the same as 20mm fuses, and I can't recall the BS number).

[Alang]

Yes. Screw fastened plug to hold it in place. The mains were a 5amp system using what may have been Northeastern electric board proprietary plugs. They were brown cases on white base with two offset blade conductors and a central hollow earth pin. I have never seen any since the mid 60s.

One of the neighbours had a telephone