strange electrical goings on

[Chris]

I've witnessed a couple of strange things in our domestic electrical circuits recently.

1. Flickering light. I checked behind the switch and found that the earth wire had come loose. Reconnecting it solved the problem. I'm not an electrician, but this doesn't sound right to me - I could understand it it was a loose live or neutral...

1. We have two lighting circuits in the house (upstairs and downstairs). The fuse blew on the downstairs circuit. All the lights in the house stopped working, even though the fuse for the upstairs circuit was fine. Replacing the blown fuse brought all the lights back to life. Subsequently, removing the fuse for each of the circuits individually gave the exepect result - only the lights on that circuit stopped working.

Can any electrician out there give me an idea what's going on?

Thanks, Chris.

[The Natural Philosopher]

It sounds like a complete overhaul is needed.

Looks like the wiring is random as to whether breakers are in the live neutral or earth.

And colors have been simply switched around till 'stuff worked'

I don't want to get all Elfin Safety about this, but if you know this, and fail to address it, you MAY void your house insurance.

Without more detail its hard to be sure, but its worrying enough to warrant at least a visit from a competent electrician, or if you feel up to it some detailed investigation yourself.

It might require a complete rewire..

I think if it were me,I would immediately check my house insurance poilicy, and if the house was recently acquired, contact my solicitor.

Then I would contact the insurance company and say 'I think my house is is in a dangerous condition, and may need a rewire, what is your position with respect to covering the cost of this?

[Andy Wade]

Possibly a loose terminal screw on the switch too, which you disturbed enough to restore good connection (for a while, anyway).

Very strange that one. A loose connection inside the consumer unit or fusebox might account for it. Knowing what caused the fuse to blow in the first place might help, as would some idea of the age and type of wiring involved.

I think you'd be well advised to get a Periodic Inspection done by a competent electrician. Loose connections can lead to fires.

[Stuart B]

And they will say" Our position is quite clear Mr XXX . You pay for the work" Since when did house insurance pay for these sort of events .?

[chrisj.doran]

a) Did you check _all_ the screws in the switch? Maybe two were loose. Alternatively you may have a switch on the way out or a break inside the insulation of one of the other wires and moving things has temporarily fixed it.

b) Are you sure it was an earth wire? What was it connected to? The back of the box or the switch itself? If the latter, is this a two-way switch, i.e. you can operate the light from switches in two places? If so, the wire you tightened, probably yellow rather than yellow/green, is actually a live.

I've known the *bang* of a blowing fuse to jiggle a loose neighbour, giving the effect you describe. Also, you could have a loose screw in the fusebox.

Whilst as TNF says, in principle it would be a good idea to have the installation checked out, you need to find an honest tradesman to do it, not one angling for a complete rewire, or at least replacement of the consumer unit. A standard ploy is to say (incorrectly) that the regs require you to change to MCBs etc., with the scare line that rewirable fuses (whict it sounds as if you have you have) are "likely to cause sparks and fire".

I would suggest you either get a knowledgeable DIYer who isn't angling for a job to look it over for you (does Part P still allow you to check someone else's installation?) or do some basic checks yourself:-

(a) Get one of the cheap tester plugs that make sure you haven't got any reversed live/neutral/earth connections in any sockets, and

(b) Go round with a screwdriver tightening all the screws. It's not unknown for them to work loose with time or maybe the sparks who did the job had a weak wrist that day. (Chris's rule: If you haven't just stripped the thread it wasn't tight enough.)

Chris

[The Real Doctor]

To which their reply, after they had stopped laughing, would be "Fuck off. Oh, and consider your policy cancelled."

Ian