Hi,
How long should a service cable remain in service? My grandparents still have their orginal 1937 vintage cable and I wondered when they should be replaced? They replaced the meter and part of the cutout last year.
Overhead or underground?
An underground cable of that vintage will probably be paper-insulated (impreganted with a mineral oil), lead sheathed and armoured with steel tape. It's life span is almost indefinite.
Overhead cables of that vintage *should* be considered highly suspect. It will almost certainly be a poly-butyl jute construction, and the insulation has a tendency to harden and crack, particularly at exposed locations.
It is underground.
The house was last rewired with pvc in 1960. I am trying to convince them to get it upgraded, as the earth connection is suspect T-N-S and no crossbonds there are also some dark cables that have BICC Ashton cable written on them. I suspect these may be VIR.
Those cables will be butyl rubber. VIR was a rubber which was served on the outside by a woven cotton and wax, designed to be used in conduit. Both would be long overdue for replacement.
Usually until they go bang or you pay for a new one, although that's more of a 'does' than 'should', but still applies.
SJW A.C.S. Ltd.
Harry Bloomfield retched Service life of electricty mains onto my recliner:
Harry likes rubber.
Here in Cheshire we still see some of the old lead sheathed cable in the street lighting columns on the fifth core switch wire system. The cable is thicker than split con and has flakes falling off it.
Jon.
here in Birmingham we still got a copper electrode (a sliver of metal) in a lemon, the citric acid in the lemon will react with the metals and make a small electric current so we can see in the dark
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