Why are electrical cables and flex different colours?

[Owain]

"Alistair Riddell" wrote | > In theory you can get the new colours now, and you are allowed to | > use them. In practice, I've yet to see anyone supplying them -- | > neither the likes of B&Q nor either of the wholesalers I use have | > the new colours (well, I haven't actually asked, but if you just | > ask for a drum of cable without specifying, you get the old colours). | At my PoW we have been supplied with cable in the new colours. Didn't ask | for it specially - it just arrived with the new colours.

Shop near me having wiring done is being done in the new colours.

Owain

[Dave Plowman (News)]

A large percentage of the male population is to some extent red green colour blind - most noticeable in poor light.

It's not an old wives's tale that women are better at matching colours.

[Brian Sharrock]

'I know a guy' ... for reasons that don't concern the story;- The Navy had arranged at great expense to demonstrate a piece of kit to two of us, the other guy -call him Dick- was _exceptionally_ quiet during the demo. As the jolly matelots switched on this and selected that to indicate thus, Dick remained shtum ... while driving back, I commented;- "You were quiet today, Dick?" He responded; "I'm red colour-blind and couldn't see a thing!" Every monitor, LED, legend and read-out was red - to Dick's eyes, the Jacks had been playing with a totally dead piece of kit!

[Andy Hall]

Especially in clothing stores.....

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Heh heh.

The obvious one is where you need some paint made up to match some say furnishings. Don't ask a male assistant for help...

[Paul]

Funny you should say that.

I've just had a nightmare job to colour match a deep red paint. The first three attempts from different suppliers were miles out; the ones that used a photspectrometer the worst!

Finally I went to another supplier which was 'manned' by just two women. The first scanned the colour and mixed up a sample, which she compared, and decided it wasn't a good match. Her colleague came over, glanced at my sample, and pronounced, 'Oh, that's Royal Maroon' and just produced a tin off the shelf, which was an exact match!

[Dave Stanton]

The Navy gives you a free colour blindness test if you wasnt to be a electrician on board ship. You don't get trained if you are !!!

Dave

[Dave Stanton]

Go and have a look at your local hospital, if its anything like ours they will have big notices saying no one is to use any new colour wiring. ( iassume until given permission, but it does'nt say that)

Dave

[:::Jerry::::]

F*ck knows how most car paint is *colour* matched then....

[Dave Plowman (News)]

At one time colour vision was pretty important for all pro sailors - being able to distinguish between distant red and green lights. They tested peripheral vision for this at one time if you wanted to join the merchant navy. A school pal tried and failed.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

In the case of mine, badly. BMW main agent subbing out the work.

[:::Jerry::::]

Well, you have my email address Dave, don't you !... :~)

[Capitol]

It is an old wives tale that women are better at matching colours. When colour tv set up was done by eye, it was found that women were not actually as accurate as men due to their colour perception having a greater variation. Hence the move to computerised colour matching.

Regards Capitol

[Angus Marshall]

Takes me back to my schooldays - we had 3 physics teachers :

1 was red-green colour blind 1 was blue-yellow colour blind

and

the third was an idiot

Can you picture how resistor discussion went ?!?!?!?!?!?????

[Dave Plowman (News)]

It's not an old wives tale that more men are 'colour blind' than women - it's a provable fact.

In those days, colour TVs left the factory only approximately right - the final adjustment was done in the home.

And of course it's cheaper.

[Gel]

The change must be completed by 2006 after which time the old colour cable cannot be sold in UK; so in run up to then will be some good cable deals I guess!!

3 core & earth old & new even more complicated! At junctions of old & new, a warning label must be affixed.

This is another bad case of harm>

[Dave Plowman (News)]

It would be a very poor business which holds stocks until then.

To you, perhaps, because it's what you're used to.

[Owain]

":::Jerry::::" wrote | "Dave Plowman (News)" | > > >It's not an old wives's tale that women are better at matching | > > >colours. | > > Especially in clothing stores.....

If they're better at it, why does it take them so long to decide if something 'goes' with something else ;-)

| > Heh heh. | > The obvious one is where you need some paint made up to match | > some say furnishings. Don't ask a male assistant for help... | F*ck knows how most car paint is *colour* matched then....

Most car paint is bought by men. Customer can't tell the difference, customer happy.

Owain

[:::Jerry::::]

Most car paint is mixed by men, in car bodyshops anyway...... Doh !

[Capitol]

Only if it was necessary to reconverge. Delivered consumer product colour rendering was factory set. Studio monitors were locally set to allow for special lighting conditions.

Initially it was more expensive, but the Japanese led the way in producing non adjustment necessary sets and to compete on price, the US and Europe had to develop the ICs which allowed the reduction of the labour content.

Today, as we know, it is uneconomic to produce almost any high volume hardware consumer item in the EU other than in the low labour cost member states. (Where is all this new coloured wire coming from?)

Hence the creeping decline in UK manufacturing employment (down by 300K I believe) and the decrease in the income tax take as many of these jobs were relatively higher paid than working in fast food.

I guess one of the next stages will be further outsourcing of TV program production etc to Eastern Europe or the far East!

Regards Capitol