Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

Form, when it arrives turns out to be not duly arduous. Most difficult
technical question concerns whether the supply is single phase or
three phase. Other questions deal with combined power requirements of
oven and hob, whether there is a washing machine/tumble dryer/
dishwasher and how many storage heaters there are.

A note at the bottom advises that the form should be completed by a
suitably qualified electrician and if it is not then formal approval
for the works must be provided by the local authority's Building
Control Department. Surely the people that they send to do the work
will be suitably qualified? And since when has Part P notification
been required for counting storage heaters?

More jobs for the boys.

Andrew

It's probably a general form used by EDF for a variety of work - some
of which may require notification of building control.

You haven't got to the fun bit yet - EDF charged me 280 quid for 25
minutes work to move the cutout and shorten the incomers.

On 27 May, 23:42, " wrote:
It's probably a general form used by EDF for a variety of work - some
of which may require notification of building control.

You haven't got to the fun bit yet - EDF charged me 280 quid for 25
minutes work to move the cutout and shorten the incomers.

Ouch! They haven't mentioned a charge for changing the fuse yet. In as
much as they do specifically say that if the earthing arrangements
need to be upgraded then there will be a charge. If its going to cost
then I will probably elect not to have it done. It's not exactly
essential since the supply coped quite happily with a 60A fuse when it
still had storage heaters

Andrew

"Andrew" wrote in message
oups.com...
On 27 May, 23:42, " wrote:
It's probably a general form used by EDF for a variety of work -
some
of which may require notification of building control.

You haven't got to the fun bit yet - EDF charged me 280 quid for
25
minutes work to move the cutout and shorten the incomers.

Ouch! They haven't mentioned a charge for changing the fuse yet. In
as
much as they do specifically say that if the earthing arrangements
need to be upgraded then there will be a charge. If its going to
cost
then I will probably elect not to have it done. It's not exactly
essential since the supply coped quite happily with a 60A fuse when
it
still had storage heaters

Andrew


I managed to blow my 60a fuse - it was to my knowledge at least 22
years old and I have a home workshop with large motors with heavy
starting currents. It was a Sunday - I called EDF and they had a man
here in under ten minutes (!!!) - it took very little persuasion to
get him to put a 100 amp one in !

AWEM

Andrew Mawson wrote:
"Andrew" wrote in message
oups.com...
On 27 May, 23:42, " wrote:
It's probably a general form used by EDF for a variety of work -
some
of which may require notification of building control.

You haven't got to the fun bit yet - EDF charged me 280 quid for
25
minutes work to move the cutout and shorten the incomers.
Ouch! They haven't mentioned a charge for changing the fuse yet. In
as
much as they do specifically say that if the earthing arrangements
need to be upgraded then there will be a charge. If its going to
cost
then I will probably elect not to have it done. It's not exactly
essential since the supply coped quite happily with a 60A fuse when
it
still had storage heaters

Andrew


I managed to blow my 60a fuse - it was to my knowledge at least 22
years old and I have a home workshop with large motors with heavy
starting currents. It was a Sunday - I called EDF and they had a man
here in under ten minutes (!!!) - it took very little persuasion to
get him to put a 100 amp one in !

Maybe you could lend the OP one of your machines for an hour...? ;-)

David

On 28 May, 08:26, Lobster wrote:
Andrew Mawson wrote:
"Andrew" wrote in message
roups.com...
On 27 May, 23:42, " wrote:
It's probably a general form used by EDF for a variety of work -
some
of which may require notification of building control.

You haven't got to the fun bit yet - EDF charged me 280 quid for
25
minutes work to move the cutout and shorten the incomers.
Ouch! They haven't mentioned a charge for changing the fuse yet. In
as
much as they do specifically say that if the earthing arrangements
need to be upgraded then there will be a charge. If its going to
cost
then I will probably elect not to have it done. It's not exactly
essential since the supply coped quite happily with a 60A fuse when
it
still had storage heaters

Andrew

I managed to blow my 60a fuse - it was to my knowledge at least 22
years old and I have a home workshop with large motors with heavy
starting currents. It was a Sunday - I called EDF and they had a man
here in under ten minutes (!!!) - it took very little persuasion to
get him to put a 100 amp one in !

Maybe you could lend the OP one of your machines for an hour...? ;-)

David

Maybe wear welding goggles, a heavy pair of gloves and using a
sacrificial screwdriver might be easier! Perhaps in the middle of a
work day rather than risk a weekend.

Rob

On 28 May, 09:03, robgraham wrote:

Maybe wear welding goggles, a heavy pair of gloves and using a
sacrificial screwdriver might be easier! Perhaps in the middle of a
work day rather than risk a weekend.

Rob

With a pssc of anything upto 6kA that could be explosive. Exploding
red hot things are kinda frowned on here - more popular in America.


NT

Maybe wear welding goggles, a heavy pair of gloves and using a
sacrificial screwdriver might be easier! Perhaps in the middle of a
work day rather than risk a weekend.

After the house has burnt down, the burns have healed, and the
insurance company laughed at the claim - it might not seem like such a
good idea.

In article . com,
" writes:
Maybe wear welding goggles, a heavy pair of gloves and using a
sacrificial screwdriver might be easier! Perhaps in the middle of a
work day rather than risk a weekend.

After the house has burnt down, the burns have healed, and the
insurance company laughed at the claim - it might not seem like such a
good idea.

It is apparently not uncommon in the US for an electrician to
switch off the circuit they want to work on by shorting it out.
Sometimes, the results are exactly as you describe.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

In article . com,
Andrew wrote:
A note at the bottom advises that the form should be completed by a
suitably qualified electrician and if it is not then formal approval
for the works must be provided by the local authority's Building
Control Department. Surely the people that they send to do the work
will be suitably qualified? And since when has Part P notification
been required for counting storage heaters?

A neighbour has ancient wiring and little money so sort of asked my advice
about making things safe in the most economical way. One major concern I
had was that there was no proper earthing arrangements, and thought that
should be sorted before getting quotes for the re-wiring. So on her behalf
I contacted EDF about having an earth clamp fitted to the incoming cable.

The pro forma invoice that arrived stated the existing installation has to
have a completed test certificate before they will carry out any
alteration to the meter or termination position. And the minimum charge
will be 147 quid. Plus VAT, of course.

Seems to me a chicken and egg situation. Can a certificate be provided on
even a new installation with nothing to earth it to?

--
*I don't suffer from insanity; I enjoy every minute of it.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Seems to me a chicken and egg situation. Can a certificate be provided on
even a new installation with nothing to earth it to?

Its a bit weird - I provided a new consumer unit with just a double
socket, tails and earth (water pipe) bonds attached - at the position
I wanted the incomers moved to.

So I borrowed a 16th Ed tester, and dutifuly filled out the IEE test
forms - the vast majority of the entries being blank - and not one of
the engineers even glanced at the forms whilst they were here.

Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article . com,
" writes:
Maybe wear welding goggles, a heavy pair of gloves and using a
sacrificial screwdriver might be easier! Perhaps in the middle of a
work day rather than risk a weekend.
After the house has burnt down, the burns have healed, and the
insurance company laughed at the claim - it might not seem like such a
good idea.

It is apparently not uncommon in the US for an electrician to
switch off the circuit they want to work on by shorting it out.
Sometimes, the results are exactly as you describe.

Why can you not remove the fuse, then damage it in some way, replace and
ask them to come and fix it? So the seal is broken, well I reckon that
many are, certainly mine was when I came to this house, my daughters is
also.

On 28 May 2007 01:46:07 -0700, wrote:

With a pssc of anything upto 6kA that could be explosive.

Depending on how close the point of SC and the state of the cabling
bewteen it and the substation the PSCC current could be a lot more than
6kA. But yes it'll make a very big bang, I wouldn't like to be in the same
room as bits of molten metal go flying about the place.

Making the assumption that the volts drop to about 160 when supplying 6kA
you are still looking at 1MW of power being dissipated in a very small
space.

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

wrote:
Seems to me a chicken and egg situation. Can a certificate be provided on
even a new installation with nothing to earth it to?

Its a bit weird - I provided a new consumer unit with just a double
socket, tails and earth (water pipe) bonds attached - at the position
I wanted the incomers moved to.

I've done the same thing in the past, in order to provide myself with a
live double socket with then provided the power I needed to wire up the
property! Didn't seem to cause the engineers any problem.

David

On 27 May 2007 15:31:55 -0700, Andrew
mused:

Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

I just happened to be at home when the chap from somewhere came out
and changed the meter so while he was there I made sure he stuck a
100A fuse in and that the tails were 25mm from cutout to meter.
Offered him coffee but he refused and did the work anyway.
--
Regards,
Stuart.

On 2007-05-28 17:16:12 +0100, Lurch said:

On 27 May 2007 15:31:55 -0700, Andrew
mused:

Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

I just happened to be at home when the chap from somewhere came out
and changed the meter so while he was there I made sure he stuck a
100A fuse in and that the tails were 25mm from cutout to meter.
Offered him coffee but he refused and did the work anyway.

Must be a bugger trying to wire up such short tails.....

On Mon, 28 May 2007 19:59:32 +0100, Andy Hall
mused:

On 2007-05-28 17:16:12 +0100, Lurch said:

On 27 May 2007 15:31:55 -0700, Andrew
mused:

Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

I just happened to be at home when the chap from somewhere came out
and changed the meter so while he was there I made sure he stuck a
100A fuse in and that the tails were 25mm from cutout to meter.
Offered him coffee but he refused and did the work anyway.

Must be a bugger trying to wire up such short tails.....

Erm, yeah, or no......

Must admit, you've lost me on that one. Sorry.
--
Regards,
Stuart.

On 2007-05-28 20:02:38 +0100, Lurch said:

On Mon, 28 May 2007 19:59:32 +0100, Andy Hall
mused:

On 2007-05-28 17:16:12 +0100, Lurch said:

On 27 May 2007 15:31:55 -0700, Andrew
mused:

Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

I just happened to be at home when the chap from somewhere came out
and changed the meter so while he was there I made sure he stuck a
100A fuse in and that the tails were 25mm from cutout to meter.
Offered him coffee but he refused and did the work anyway.

Must be a bugger trying to wire up such short tails.....

Erm, yeah, or no......

Must admit, you've lost me on that one. Sorry.

How could one install the cutout 25mm from the meter? :-)

On Mon, 28 May 2007 20:22:34 +0100, Andy Hall
mused:

On 2007-05-28 20:02:38 +0100, Lurch said:

On Mon, 28 May 2007 19:59:32 +0100, Andy Hall
mused:

On 2007-05-28 17:16:12 +0100, Lurch said:

On 27 May 2007 15:31:55 -0700, Andrew
mused:

Having just had consumer unit and tails upgraded I called my
electricity supplier to enquire about having the main fuse upgraded
from 60A to 100A to match the main breaker in the consumer unit just
in case I ever needed the extra juice. They put me on to EDF who
apparently do that work. Nice lady at EDF tells me that there is a
form that must be completed for them to consider the request. Form
duly dispatched.

I just happened to be at home when the chap from somewhere came out
and changed the meter so while he was there I made sure he stuck a
100A fuse in and that the tails were 25mm from cutout to meter.
Offered him coffee but he refused and did the work anyway.

Must be a bugger trying to wire up such short tails.....

Erm, yeah, or no......

Must admit, you've lost me on that one. Sorry.

How could one install the cutout 25mm from the meter? :-)

Well, smartarse, you can get connection kits that are basically 25mm
of tails so the meter just drops on top of the cutout.

Although you knew I meant 25mm CSA but haven't got a ^2 option.
--
Regards,
Stuart.