Andy Wade wrote:

Tony Polson wrote:

red = live

NO, NO, NO. RED was EARTH - definitely. Obvious danger lurks...
Now you see why harmonisation of colours was such a good idea.

black = neutral

Black is live, I think.

but is the grey wire really the earth?

Grey for neutral

Definitive advice will be very much appreciated!

I'm not 100% sure about the last two, but RED IS DEFINITELY EARTH.


Thanks Andy. You're right, the red is definitely the earth. The red
wire is clearly earthed to the metal chassis of the projector.

There is an in-line switch in the cable so I thought I would open it
up to see which of the other colour wires was switched, implying that
it would be the live wire. The good news was that the red wire was
connected to a chromed brass plate around the bakelite switch, further
confirming that it is the earth, and that one conductor was switched
and the other not. So far so good.

Unfortunately the bad news is that the unswitched conductor is
connected to the black wire at one end of the switch and the grey wire
at the other. wry grin This presumably didn't matter in Germany as
the plug could be inserted either way up. But it matters here, so I
will borrow a multimeter and check which colour wire is the live feed
to the lamp.

Thanks to everyone who replied.