Doctor Drivel wrote:

They do not have countless sockets on one radial. In France it is 8
maximum on a 16A MCB.

Which exemplifies why low capacity radials are not well suited to
general power provision in a home.

Far less practical from an installers point of view.

You mean cheap, having all the downsrairs sockets on one 32A MCB. They
would have that split into many 16 MCBs. Better. Divider and rule.

One ring circuit for the kitchen, another for the other downstairs
sockets, plus a non RCD protected radial for any circuits with low trip
tolerance would seem more than adequate in most domestic situations.

Use of whole house RCDs is also long since deprecated.

Long since? Like a few years then.

some 20 odd, yes.

More a few years. I have seen many new builds with RCDs on the whole CU.

Whole house RCDs were briefly allowed in the 15th edition IIUC. So since
that covered the '80s basically, the scope when that was acceptable was
limited. It fairly soon became apparent that it was not a good solution.

hidden behind the appliance. He thought the system was mad and said

Fuses in plugs don't routinely blow unless the appliance develops a
fault. You probably won't be repairing that in situ under the worktop
either, so not really a problem is it.

They CAN blow and when they do an appliance has to be dragged out.

They can, but rarely if ever do in the absence of a fault. I don't
recall the last time I need to replace a fuse for a non faulty appliance.

What and lower our standards and safety record to match theirs you mean?

Theirs superior.

Figures?

I understand ours and it is cheap and nasty. In France to isolate a
dishwasher you go to the CU and throw the RCBO. Any problems and they
throws.

Here you would throw the switch above the counter marked "Dishwasher",
seems somewhat better to me.

--
Cheers,

John.

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