Death through dodgy wiring

[Richard Porter]

Yes, when I moved into this house I found that the previous owner had managed to drill through the ring main just a foot or so vertically above a socket. He'd also drilled through the tv aerial cable. Later I discovered that some sheving in the kitchen had been put up with dummy screw heads in two of the brackets because of cables underneath.

I'd always thought cables should run horizointally and vertically but not diagonally across a wall. My meter and CU are under the stairs, and most of the cabling up to the first floor runs parallel to the staircase i.e. at about 45 deg. in the kitchen wall. Having worked out where the trunking went I was able to reposition the shelf brackets.

[EricP]

Also explains a long wondered at mystery!

Why none of my internal walls has a socket on!

My sparse socket provision has all of them placed on external, and therefore thick walls.

I wanted to put more sockets in, now I must rethink.

Anyway, thanks for sorting a long outstanding mystery.

[Stefek Zaba]

Not quite: they put a screw through a cable, but it wasn't holding an Appliance, just a bit of metalwork (some fancy-pantsy chromed cutlery rack, mfg cost 2 squid, yours-at-Heals-for-only-40-notes or some such). And it was the all-too-effective earthing of a nearby appliance which provided a low-impedance path to earth for the fatal current.

RCDs good. RCDs sensible. RCDs not definitely required for kitchen sockets, though - a damn good idea, but currently only required for "sockets reasonably foreseeably used for powering portable appliances outside the house"...

Me with coroner here: main chunk of blame on kitchen installer misrouting cable, with contributory lack of care from later householder putting screw into wall without cable-detector (10? 15? quid from your d-i-y emporium) and from family members going "ooh, it tingles" but doing sod-all about it...

Stefek

[Hugo Nebula]

On 12 Oct 2004 01:17:50 -0700, a particular chimpanzee named [e-mail] (TimD) randomly hit the keyboard and produced:

The wiring (by the report) wasn't installed correctly, but how is a BCO or any electrical inspector to know that after it's been covered over? Admittedly, probably the route of the wiring may be easy to spot or detect, but what about the depth?

[Andy Dingley]

Yeah, lets make the poor guy suffer for his sins. How about having his wife die ? - that'll teach him ! 8-(

Maybe he screwed up (and to be honest, I don;t think he did more than a tiny amount of extra-caution). But he wasn't the major cause here and it's grossly callous to gloat.

You earth your kitchen pan racks ?

[Stefek Zaba]

No, it's permitted to run cables in walls at less than 50mm depth when they're in the "standard" places: vertically or horizontally in line with visible electric fittings, and within 150mm of top and side corners. So your plans to cable new sockets on your internal walls are fine; just run the cable in the "conventional" routes. Otherwise, few Barrat boxes could have sockets on their internal walls!

Stefek

[EricP]

ROFL!!

Cheers

[Lee]

We have a whole house 30ma RCD, which I know is deprecated but we have no intention of changing. Arguments aside, the only problems we have had is with a leaky washing machine motor and leaky elements.

All of which would have later failed anyway, possibly in slightly more dramatic fashion ;)

Lee

[AndyP]

Visited one of my friends at the weekend - he bought his house brand new about a year ago. He was putting in an outside tap at the weekend, and after consulting the diagrams showing where all the pipework ran underneath the surface of the wall, and making use of his wire/metal/stud detector thing he started drilling.... straight through the Hep2O running diagonally underneath the plasterboard.

He was not happy.

>

[Tony Bryer]

As the other posts state you can do it. You just have to put the cables in the prescribed zone.

[Mike]

Another interesting question is woulp part P make any difference.

If this was not a "New Circuit" it wouldnt have needed any checking anyway!

[Tony Bryer]

No, but the new Part Q requiring all plate racks to be wooden will .

It does appear that in the absence of any other faults you could have had an electrical report done on this house the day before the accident and it would have been clean.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

You'd earth a kitchen tool rack?

Having just changed my CU to a split load one, I've not included the kitchen ring on the RCD side - due to possible leakage from the various heating elements in appliances.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

But in this case, kitchens are frequently tiled.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Not at all. You may have cables just below the surface provided they follow the approved runs. Or are properly protected.

[Jimbo]

NEWS FLASH___NATIONAL GRID TO BE REPLACED TOMORROW WITH DIRECT CURRENT SYSTEM. Failing that--all contractors and DIYers shall be excecuted at sunrise. Signed by--Couldn't Resist'it MP

[Dave Liquorice]

But if you don't have a matching fitting on the other side of the wall you have to go for your next statement:

Which is a bit tricky to do... without dismantling the wall.

[EricP]

I'm waiting for:

"In the interests of safety, all electricity is to be removed from private homes and only Professional Places will be exempt from this requirement.(Creosote may also be used in these places)"

[Andy Wade]

Yes it would: all electrical work in kitchens and bathrooms will notifiable under Part P - see

1.

[Bob]

I think we just need to accept that just as driving cars mean that sometimes people will get run over, so electricity in the home will sometimes lead to electrocution. In both cases the usefulness of the killer is deemed to outweigh the loss of life it causes.

Certainly there are rules things that could imposed to reduce the toll - 30 mph everywhere maximum speed for a car, visible conduits for wiring - but those kind of limits would be unacceptable to most people.

Out of interest, does anyone know just how many people get electrocuted in the home each year in this country? Is it really enough to warrent these new regulations?

Bob