What earthing system do (should!) I have?

4 way Wylexes are typical 70s kit, and were widely installed in the 80s as well. Those old Wylexes arent as old as they first appear. In the 70s they were partly wooden, and many people have misjudged their age.

ha, I hope so! If the leccy were added _sfter_ the gas there would be more reason to worry :)

Local earth rod, which you probably have in the form of an incoming metal water mains pipe. Confirming low R doesnt mean all is well, but it at least would eliminate the biggest possible risk of all, the lack of any functional earth.

Unfortunately having an earth connection doesnt automatically imply it will work as a safety feature. If earth R is too high, with no RCD the fuse wires would sit there forever more before anything blows, with the whole earth circuit live - but its not very likely to be anything like that bad.

NT

Reply to
N. Thornton
Loading thread data ...

First, resist the urge to do what youd really like to do. A lawyer might be able to advise.

This is the penultimate result of the modern practice of putting complete t--- in charge of things that matter.

"Well it must be safe and OK because none of our agents have ever reported it as being an issue"

what a joke. I would be tempted to repeat that sentence slowly, word by word, as if writing it down, then suggest that if that comes out in court after an accident they would really have problems. And that yes you have warned the householders in writing of the dangers present.

NT

Reply to
N. Thornton

Well for those that are interested (and somebody must be, as >90 of you have inspected the shambles on the website link I gave!) I wasted another hour or so on this "project" this morning...

I spoke to several Corgis, as well as your actual CORGI, Transco (several times each) and got more or less equal numbers of responses of "yes a corgi can move a meter" and "no a corgi can't move a meter" (it was particularly inspiring that two separate calls to Transco elicited diametrically opposite responses). A tech guy at CORGI gave me contact details of half a dozen local fitters who he said had completed their "MET 1" certification which enabled them to move meters, but the two of them I managed to get hold of said told me that was b****ks.

Finally I had, erm, a sense of humour failure on the phone with Transco, and to cut a long story short, it ended with them coming round to my way of thinking, and they sent an engineer round 3 hours later to inspect, on safety grounds. The guy who came was very relaxed about it, said he'd seen plenty worse and that it wasn't really a priority issue, but he agreed to shift it anyway, FOC. So he's left me with the meter in a new position, capped off, and all (all?) I need to do now is get a corgi round to reconnect it to the house gas system. Result! And now I can finally access, and get to grips with the electrics shambles!

David

Reply to
Lobster

From the photos it looks as if there _might_ be an earth connection made to the sheath of the supply cable - i.e. a TN-S earth. Now that the gas meter is out of the way can you post a photo showing the supply head - basically the same as 2.jpg but without the gas meter.

Other points:

- there appears no main bonding conductor to the gas service. Add this once the Corgi man has done his bit. It needs to be 10mm^2 and goes between the gas pipe on your side of the meter and the main earth terminal; ditto for water if main bonding is missing;

- clean everything up;

- replace the fuse cover on the Wylex CU.

Reply to
Andy Wade

Yippee !!! Good on ya' Davey Boy. Keep up the fight with the big monopoly's and you'll win every time.

Do we get to see the pictures of where they moved the gas meter too? Please.

Reply to
BigWallop

HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.