Thanks for all the advice - thought I'd post a report about what went
well/badly.

Wiring up the CU was a doddle. Don't quite understand how people end up
with neutrals on the RCD side when they shouldn't be, and so forth, come
about. It's easy, and I could have been done in time for lunch if I'd
wanted.

Thought it might be a good idea to do some testing first though....

Finding and fixing the break in the earth on the downstairs ring was a
PITA. But satisfying once I found it.

I booked a disconnect and reconnect, and when Seimens turned up he had
them marked on his jobsheet with no time in between. Fine by me, because
I had put a new isolator switch in. But he wasn't happy about just
connecting the tails to that without seeing the new CU up and running.
He did it, but said he'd try to get back later to test it. He also
quizzed me about my main bonding - I gave him one wire to connect
(upgrading from the old 6mm) which I'd connected to the water then to
the gas - wanted to make sure I hadn't broken it at the water. Thanks to
uk.d-i-y for that pointed. The "testing" he wanted to do, turned out to
be turning up at 5pm, handing me a socket tester to plug in and waiting
to hear it beep. He didn't even come through the door. All he cared
about was whether I had phase and neutral the right way round!

What else? Couldn't get the SWA cables off the old CU. Not really a
problem, as I had already decided not to connect them to the new CU -
going to run through a subsidiary metal box instead.

Also found several double sockets where R1+R2 was correct on one
socket, but too high on the other one. The resistance generally changed
if I unplugged and replugged a few times, so I put it down to corrosion
on the internal contacts - don't see what else it can be. None of them
were *too* high, so I left most of them, except for one in the kitchen
which I replaced. I'll replace the others in the next few days.

Found a switched neutral in the dining room, which I need to fix as
well. Other than that, everything fine. No problem with insulation
resistances, and the new RCD tested out fine.

On Fri, 02 Dec 2005 14:12:54 GMT, Ben Blaukopf
wrote:

I booked a disconnect and reconnect, and when Seimens turned up he had
them marked on his jobsheet with no time in between.

How much did they charge?



--

Matt wrote:
On Fri, 02 Dec 2005 14:12:54 GMT, Ben Blaukopf
wrote:


I booked a disconnect and reconnect, and when Seimens turned up he had
them marked on his jobsheet with no time in between.


How much did they charge?

Nothing (I hope!). Powergen certainly said nothing about charging me for
it when I called up to book it. Siemens chap asked me if I was being
charged for the visit - not sure why he wanted to know - maybe it
affected the testing he did/didn't do.

Ben