Our house flooded in June last year, and the entire downstairs was
stripped out. The electrics in the house where old, and so a rewire
was performed at the same time, on the whole house, however:

1) We have no documentation or certificates to say this has been done,
should we have had something?

2) The labels on the fuse box are incorrect (a new fuse box). Today,
the shower switch blew, and an unlabelled MCB had tripped. The MCB
labelled shower hadn't tripped, but I flicked it off manually while I
investigated. I noticed that the upstairs 13A sockets at this point
went off. I have now reset the MCB labelled shower and the upstairs
sockets are working. Until I fit a new switch in the bathroom, I have
no idea whether the sockets are on the same circuit (!!!???) or
whether as I think, the labels are just wrong. This is surely bad
news!

3) On the subject of the shower, they did not rewire this. This was
previously outside of the normal fuse box, on it's own MCB and RCD.
It's now part of the main box, however, the wires do not have appear
to have been replaced. The cable running from the fuse box to the
switch is of the brown and blue variety. The cable running from the
switch into the shower is of the red and black variety. This is how
it was prior to the rewire when the shower was fitted about five years
ago. (I suppose I cannot guarantee that the fuse box to switch hasn't,
but cetainly they shouldn't have fitted the red/black one, and I do
remember this being these colours when we replaced the switch before
the floods).

By the way, the 45A DP switch was from B&Q and only 2 weeks old, I
fitted this myself 2 weeks ago. When it was switched on, it made a
large bang and was stuck in the on position. I took the switch off
and disassembled the unit carefully. All the springs where out of
place, and some of the metal connections had come apart. There was no
excessive blackness or any melting. The blackness was not on the
actual connections the wire comes into direct contact with, but on
some of the bits connecting to this. The previous switch had
blackened at the Live load terminal, and melted. I stripped the wire
back cutting off the black parts, before fitting the new switch. This
terminal was still a shiny gold on the new switch today. I had
noticed the last couple of days a minor spark when turning on the
switch.

wrote in message
...
Our house flooded in June last year, and the entire downstairs was
stripped out. The electrics in the house where old, and so a rewire
was performed at the same time, on the whole house, however:

1) We have no documentation or certificates to say this has been done,
should we have had something?

2) The labels on the fuse box are incorrect (a new fuse box). Today,
the shower switch blew, and an unlabelled MCB had tripped. The MCB
labelled shower hadn't tripped, but I flicked it off manually while I
investigated. I noticed that the upstairs 13A sockets at this point
went off. I have now reset the MCB labelled shower and the upstairs
sockets are working. Until I fit a new switch in the bathroom, I have
no idea whether the sockets are on the same circuit (!!!???) or
whether as I think, the labels are just wrong. This is surely bad
news!

3) On the subject of the shower, they did not rewire this. This was
previously outside of the normal fuse box, on it's own MCB and RCD.
It's now part of the main box, however, the wires do not have appear
to have been replaced. The cable running from the fuse box to the
switch is of the brown and blue variety. The cable running from the
switch into the shower is of the red and black variety. This is how
it was prior to the rewire when the shower was fitted about five years
ago. (I suppose I cannot guarantee that the fuse box to switch hasn't,
but cetainly they shouldn't have fitted the red/black one, and I do
remember this being these colours when we replaced the switch before
the floods).

By the way, the 45A DP switch was from B&Q and only 2 weeks old, I
fitted this myself 2 weeks ago. When it was switched on, it made a
large bang and was stuck in the on position. I took the switch off
and disassembled the unit carefully. All the springs where out of
place, and some of the metal connections had come apart. There was no
excessive blackness or any melting. The blackness was not on the
actual connections the wire comes into direct contact with, but on
some of the bits connecting to this. The previous switch had
blackened at the Live load terminal, and melted. I stripped the wire
back cutting off the black parts, before fitting the new switch. This
terminal was still a shiny gold on the new switch today. I had
noticed the last couple of days a minor spark when turning on the
switch.

Why are you switching it off? Surely it is for isolation purposes. It all
sounds very suspect.

On Thu, 4 Sep 2008 23:56:33 +0100, "John"
wrote:


wrote in message
...
Our house flooded in June last year, and the entire downstairs was
stripped out. The electrics in the house where old, and so a rewire
was performed at the same time, on the whole house, however:

1) We have no documentation or certificates to say this has been done,
should we have had something?

2) The labels on the fuse box are incorrect (a new fuse box). Today,
the shower switch blew, and an unlabelled MCB had tripped. The MCB
labelled shower hadn't tripped, but I flicked it off manually while I
investigated. I noticed that the upstairs 13A sockets at this point
went off. I have now reset the MCB labelled shower and the upstairs
sockets are working. Until I fit a new switch in the bathroom, I have
no idea whether the sockets are on the same circuit (!!!???) or
whether as I think, the labels are just wrong. This is surely bad
news!

3) On the subject of the shower, they did not rewire this. This was
previously outside of the normal fuse box, on it's own MCB and RCD.
It's now part of the main box, however, the wires do not have appear
to have been replaced. The cable running from the fuse box to the
switch is of the brown and blue variety. The cable running from the
switch into the shower is of the red and black variety. This is how
it was prior to the rewire when the shower was fitted about five years
ago. (I suppose I cannot guarantee that the fuse box to switch hasn't,
but cetainly they shouldn't have fitted the red/black one, and I do
remember this being these colours when we replaced the switch before
the floods).

By the way, the 45A DP switch was from B&Q and only 2 weeks old, I
fitted this myself 2 weeks ago. When it was switched on, it made a
large bang and was stuck in the on position. I took the switch off
and disassembled the unit carefully. All the springs where out of
place, and some of the metal connections had come apart. There was no
excessive blackness or any melting. The blackness was not on the
actual connections the wire comes into direct contact with, but on
some of the bits connecting to this. The previous switch had
blackened at the Live load terminal, and melted. I stripped the wire
back cutting off the black parts, before fitting the new switch. This
terminal was still a shiny gold on the new switch today. I had
noticed the last couple of days a minor spark when turning on the
switch.

Why are you switching it off? Surely it is for isolation purposes. It all
sounds very suspect.


If I'm reading the OP correctly ( 45A DP) it's either a wall switch
or a ceiling pull switch he speaks of so why should it not be switched
off each time the shower is finished with .I must admit I don't always
do that with my ceiling switch but a Triton engineer told me I
should.although I'm not sure why . That switch isn't for isolation
purposes .It has it's own fused ( well MCB) unit

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:24:55 +0100, wrote:

If I'm reading the OP correctly

I couldn't work out what the OP was asking about...

That switch isn't for isolation purposes .It has it's own fused ( well
MCB) unit

An MCB does not provide isolation as they are single pole. Only a double
pole device with appropiate contact spacing when open (3mm?) provides
isolation.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:03:42 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:24:55 +0100, wrote:

If I'm reading the OP correctly

I couldn't work out what the OP was asking about...

That switch isn't for isolation purposes .It has it's own fused ( well
MCB) unit

An MCB does not provide isolation as they are single pole. Only a double
pole device with appropiate contact spacing when open (3mm?) provides
isolation.

The unit my shower is connected to is a Wylex unit which I think is
DP.It has a plugin breaker which I remove after switching the unit off
..

wrote in message
...
On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:03:42 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:24:55 +0100, wrote:

If I'm reading the OP correctly

I couldn't work out what the OP was asking about...

That switch isn't for isolation purposes .It has it's own fused ( well
MCB) unit

An MCB does not provide isolation as they are single pole. Only a double
pole device with appropiate contact spacing when open (3mm?) provides
isolation.

The unit my shower is connected to is a Wylex unit which I think is
DP.It has a plugin breaker which I remove after switching the unit off
.


What? it is not hard wired.


YOU NEED A SPARK... QUICKLY,


Micky Leeds . Yorkshire.

wrote in message
...
On Thu, 4 Sep 2008 23:56:33 +0100, "John"
wrote:


wrote in message
...
Our house flooded in June last year, and the entire downstairs was
stripped out. The electrics in the house where old, and so a rewire
was performed at the same time, on the whole house, however:

1) We have no documentation or certificates to say this has been done,
should we have had something?

2) The labels on the fuse box are incorrect (a new fuse box). Today,
the shower switch blew, and an unlabelled MCB had tripped. The MCB
labelled shower hadn't tripped, but I flicked it off manually while I
investigated. I noticed that the upstairs 13A sockets at this point
went off. I have now reset the MCB labelled shower and the upstairs
sockets are working. Until I fit a new switch in the bathroom, I have
no idea whether the sockets are on the same circuit (!!!???) or
whether as I think, the labels are just wrong. This is surely bad
news!

3) On the subject of the shower, they did not rewire this. This was
previously outside of the normal fuse box, on it's own MCB and RCD.
It's now part of the main box, however, the wires do not have appear
to have been replaced. The cable running from the fuse box to the
switch is of the brown and blue variety. The cable running from the
switch into the shower is of the red and black variety. This is how
it was prior to the rewire when the shower was fitted about five years
ago. (I suppose I cannot guarantee that the fuse box to switch hasn't,
but cetainly they shouldn't have fitted the red/black one, and I do
remember this being these colours when we replaced the switch before
the floods).

By the way, the 45A DP switch was from B&Q and only 2 weeks old, I
fitted this myself 2 weeks ago. When it was switched on, it made a
large bang and was stuck in the on position. I took the switch off
and disassembled the unit carefully. All the springs where out of
place, and some of the metal connections had come apart. There was no
excessive blackness or any melting. The blackness was not on the
actual connections the wire comes into direct contact with, but on
some of the bits connecting to this. The previous switch had
blackened at the Live load terminal, and melted. I stripped the wire
back cutting off the black parts, before fitting the new switch. This
terminal was still a shiny gold on the new switch today. I had
noticed the last couple of days a minor spark when turning on the
switch.

Why are you switching it off? Surely it is for isolation purposes. It all
sounds very suspect.


If I'm reading the OP correctly ( 45A DP) it's either a wall switch
or a ceiling pull switch he speaks of so why should it not be switched
off each time the shower is finished with .I must admit I don't always
do that with my ceiling switch but a Triton engineer told me I
should.although I'm not sure why . That switch isn't for isolation
purposes .It has it's own fused ( well MCB) unit

Sounds like it is switching with a load applied if the OP is getting a minor
spark!

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 13:23:23 +0100, "Micky Savage"
wrote:


wrote in message
.. .
On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:03:42 +0100 (BST), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:24:55 +0100, wrote:

If I'm reading the OP correctly

I couldn't work out what the OP was asking about...

That switch isn't for isolation purposes .It has it's own fused ( well
MCB) unit

An MCB does not provide isolation as they are single pole. Only a double
pole device with appropiate contact spacing when open (3mm?) provides
isolation.

The unit my shower is connected to is a Wylex unit which I think is
DP.It has a plugin breaker which I remove after switching the unit off
.


What? it is not hard wired.


YOU NEED A SPARK... QUICKLY,



What on earth are you talking about ...not hard wired ?

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 20:44:38 +0100, George \(dicegeorge\) wrote:

What does 'non-maintained' mean?

It means it is not on (emiting light) all the time, it only comes on when
the power fails. Maintained lights are on 24/7 irespective of the supply
status.

Where can I get better lights than these i found at CPC?

IMHO they are all much of muchness at around the £15 mark non-maintained.
Go for one you like the appearance look of, some are a bit "industrial"
for putting at the top of the stairs in a home.

Shouldnt they eventually be on a new circuit sharing with smoke alarms
etc and without an RCD?

That would be best, if your non-maintained emergency light comes on you
know you have a problem with the smokes circuit as well. Not sure that
17th Ed will allow the use of a non-RCD circuit.

And how would I know if the emergency lights' batteries are flat or not
charging?

They have an indicator light but this probably only means the charger is
working rather than the batteries are OK. In commercial buildings you'll
find secret key switches (EMERG LIGHT TEST) that disconnects the power to
the emergency light so it can be tested. In the home you could just flip
the relevant MCB.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article ,
writes:
On 5 Sep, 21:44, "George \(dicegeorge\)"
wrote:
Which Emergency Lighting shall i buy online tonight for my house so I could
get safely downstairs if the mains fails?

EMERGENCY EXIT LIGHT, 8W MAINTAINEDhttp://cpc.farnell.com/SR06603/electrical-lighting-security/product.u...
Manufacturer: ETERNA * Order Code: SR06603 Unit Price: £15.49 (£18.20)

*ETERNA YD630NM *EMERGENCY LIGHT, 8W NON-MAINTAINED *£13.94 *(£16.38)

What does 'non-maintained' mean?
A "non-maintained" one comes on only when the mains fails. A
"maintained" one can additionally be wired to a switch so that it
doubles as an ordinary light, but it comes on/stays on if the mains
fails. As they're not very bright, the "ordinary light" feature is
only useful in small spaces or for permanently illuminated exit signs.
Where can I get better lights than these i found at CPC?
You may be able to get them on eBay for a few pounds less, but they're
all very similar.
Shouldnt they eventually be on a new circuit sharing with smoke alarms etc
and without an RCD?
The pedants will insist on a separate circuit, but that's only for
ease of testing in a public building where it's inconvenient to turn
off all the power.

No, they should be on the same circuit as the ordinary lighting in
that location, so they come on if that circuit fails. They need a
separate switch for test purposes - that's normally a keyswitch in
commercial installations so it's not inadvertently switched off.

Where can i get an alarm for this new circuit which will go off if the
electricity to it fails?
Not sure, but look for "fridge alarms".
And how would I know if the emergency lights' batteries are flat or not
charging?
They have a charging LED (which is often so bright you can see where
you're going at night . You are supposed to test them once a month
by turning the power off, so it may be convenient to put it on a fused
(but not switched) spur. In a public building you're supposed to check
they will run for an hour.

Check the instructions, but to get longest battery life and to test
them, you should run them for their rated duration (normally 3 hours)
about once a year (unless a power cut does it for you).

There are some aspects which make commercial emergency lighting less
than optimal in domestic situations...

They'll operate when the mains fails until the battery goes flat.
If the mains fails at 3pm for 12 hours, the battery will be going
flat just as the light might start to be useful. They are intended
to give cover to evacuate commercial premises, whereas you probably
want to carry on living in your house during a power cut. They are
not a substitute for having torches or other lighting sources, but
will protect you from sudden unexpected darkness.

In times when people are concerned about standby load, their
standby load stinks. This is because they recharge their battery
at high current (the standards require them to be fully recharged
and ready for another power cut quite quickly), and they don't have
any logic to stop charging when the battery is charged (they use
batteries which don't mind this and just get warm). The charging
circuitry is also very inefficient. In commercial environments,
no one will pay extra for a more efficient model, so no one makes
them (AFAIK).

They look ugly.

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

thanks chris and dave and andrew,
i'm now planning to get one of each in a few hours
and then measure the charging current etc...

--

[george]

~

On 6 Sep, 00:44, "George \(dicegeorge\)"
wrote:
thanks chris and dave and andrew,
i'm now planning to get one of each in a few hours
and then measure the charging current etc...

--

* * * * * * * * * *[george]

~ *

I've measured non-maintained one. With the battery fully charged it
takes 14ma, or about 3.5W. Tomorrow I'll run it down and see what it
takes when recharging the battery

As to where to connect it, I agree that Andrew's argument for putting
it on the lighting circuit is also a good one. In practice it will
probably come down to whatever circuit is easiest to tap into.

Chris

On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 19:57:18 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

As to where to connect it, I agree that Andrew's argument for putting
it on the lighting circuit is also a good one.

I will agree with that as well despite saying put in on the smokes circuit
earlier. The primary use of the luminaire is to produce light when the
main lighting fails *for whatever reason*.

So some form of alarm for the smokes circuit is needed, it would be easy
to have a small mains relay and use a NC pair of contacts to complete a
circuit with a battery and self oscilating peizo sounder. Have the problem
of knowing if the battery is good or not though. I wonder if you could
"borrow" the inards of a smoke alarm, that does the battery monitoring and
produces a decent sound. Using a relay again for mains failure detection.

In practice it will probably come down to whatever circuit is easiest to
tap into.

Which will probably be the lighting circuit at the top of the stairs...

--
Cheers
Dave.

On 05 Sep 2008 21:24:36 GMT, Andrew Gabriel wrote:

They'll operate when the mains fails until the battery goes flat.
If the mains fails at 3pm for 12 hours, the battery will be going
flat just as the light might start to be useful.

Or if the mains fails at 0200 they'll have flat batteries by 0500 and up
here in the winter it doesn't get light until after 0700... But it would
make it safer when going to get the other backup lighting sorted out. Last
time we had a nightime power cut the No.1 Daughter light failure alarm was
*very* effective...

In times when people are concerned about standby load, their
standby load stinks. This is because they recharge their battery
at high current (the standards require them to be fully recharged
and ready for another power cut quite quickly),

Good pointer Andrew, though I'm surprised they rely on battery cooking
rather than some form a "intelligent" charger. I'll be interested to see
the results of Chris's charge cycle measurments.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article et,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
Good pointer Andrew, though I'm surprised they rely on battery cooking
rather than some form a "intelligent" charger. I'll be interested to see
the results of Chris's charge cycle measurments.

I've got a small pile of ones removed from commercial premises
because their batteries got to the "replace-by" date. (It's always
much cheaper to fit a new emergency light than it is to buy
replacement batteries, sigh). The long ones with 8W tubes are 5W
standby, and the short ones with 4W tubes are 4W standby. Although
the batteries are now well past their "replace-by" dates, they all
still give full 3 hours, probably because they've been run down
once a year (although I only have 2 connected up).

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

On 06 Sep 2008 11:43:59 GMT, Andrew Gabriel wrote:

(It's always much cheaper to fit a new emergency light than it is to buy
replacement batteries, sigh).

Sigh indeed. It's things like this that must change in the coming years.

The long ones with 8W tubes are 5W standby, and the short ones with 4W
tubes are 4W standby.

Measured or what the plate says? I don't doubt you but I'd expect the
plate rating will be the full charge consumption rather than any standby
charge (if one exists)...

It's not so bad, an extra 1/4 unit/day if you have 2. The way you
mentioned it initially I had ideas of 20 or 30W each... Admitedly 5W is
nearly 1/2A @ 12v which is huge charging current for standby use.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article et,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
On 06 Sep 2008 11:43:59 GMT, Andrew Gabriel wrote:

(It's always much cheaper to fit a new emergency light than it is to buy
replacement batteries, sigh).

Sigh indeed. It's things like this that must change in the coming years.

The long ones with 8W tubes are 5W standby, and the short ones with 4W
tubes are 4W standby.

Measured or what the plate says? I don't doubt you but I'd expect the
plate rating will be the full charge consumption rather than any standby
charge (if one exists)...

Measured. (I can't remember if the plate says anything useful.)

It's not so bad, an extra 1/4 unit/day if you have 2. The way you
mentioned it initially I had ideas of 20 or 30W each... Admitedly 5W is
nearly 1/2A @ 12v which is huge charging current for standby use.

When you think how many of them are deployed in commercial and
public buildings, it probably adds up to a lot. If they were
ever to become common in homes, that would be even worse.
I don't actually think much of the 5W goes into the batteries.
Both types I have have a large ceramic green wire-wound resistor
which runs far too hot to touch. I haven't examined how they
operate in any detail, but it might be that when the batteries
are flat, more of the power actually goes into them.

Incidentally, these only have one or two cell NiCd batteries.
(One cell means you can safely run it completely flat without
damage, as there's no second cell which might start suffering
reverse charging.)

I've actually got 3 more emergency lights which are home-made.
One is integrated into the main light fitting, others stand alone.
They run from a central 12V SLA, and being linked to my home
automation, they only come on if it's dark outside and the
regular light in that location had been on when the power cut
happened. The room switch will then operate them instead of the
main room light, until mains power is restored.

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

"George (dicegeorge)" wrote in message
...
Which Emergency Lighting shall i buy online tonight for my house so I
could get safely downstairs if the mains fails?

EMERGENCY EXIT LIGHT, 8W MAINTAINED
http://cpc.farnell.com/SR06603/elect...=eterna-yd630m
Manufacturer: ETERNA Order Code: SR06603 Unit Price: £15.49 (£18.20)

ETERNA YD630NM EMERGENCY LIGHT, 8W NON-MAINTAINED £13.94 (£16.38)

What does 'non-maintained' mean?

Where can I get better lights than these i found at CPC?

Shouldnt they eventually be on a new circuit sharing with smoke alarms etc
and without an RCD?

Where can i get an alarm for this new circuit which will go off if the
electricity to it fails?

And how would I know if the emergency lights' batteries are flat or not
charging?

thanks

How about these, look less commercial IMHO
http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Products/EMAG3NMC.html

On 6 Sep, 04:57, wrote:
On 6 Sep, 00:44, "George \(dicegeorge\)"
wrote:

thanks chris and dave and andrew,
i'm now planning to get one of each in a few hours
and then measure the charging current etc...

--

* * * * * * * * * *[george]

~ *

I've measured non-maintained one. With the battery fully charged it
takes 14ma, or about 3.5W. Tomorrow I'll run it down and see what it
takes when recharging the battery

In the end, I measured two models, both long 8W versions. Both
discharged until the light went out before the tests began.

The one mentioned before is a TOP LITE LF502, battery dated 2006. This
took 14ma = about 3.5W regardless of the state of the charge, even
after 30 hours which is well above the 24 hours quoted for recharge.
Nothing was significantly warm after this time, not even the battery,
though the transformer runs slightly warm.

The second, a JSB Zeta II, is slightly older, 2004 on the battery.
This started at 36mA = about 8.25W and fell to 32mA = about 7.5W after
3 hours where it stayed, +/- a milliamp. The manufacturer's leaflet
says it takes 8W. The battery didn't get warm, but there is a big
green resistor that runs too hot to touch whether charging or fully
charged.

This is a bit of a surprise, as you'd really expect the current to
drop to almost nothing once fully charged, running only the
(admittedly bright) LED. If Nanny decides every home has to have
several, it'll make quite a hike in the national carbon footprint!

I note that the batteries say they should be replaced 4 years after
putting the lamp into use, which further increases the cost of
ownership. But I doubt if anyone in a domestic situation will take
that seriously as long as they keep going when you test them for
longer than you think you'll need to get out/find a torch.

I conclude that if you really feel you need emergency lighting in a
house it would be cheaper to have some battery-powered lights screwed
to the wall at strategic places, as long as you remember to check the
batteries regularly. Unlike commercial premises where there are often
visitors, the family will know their way around well enough to feel
their way to the light in the dark. Or you could use a sound-activated
"clap" light.

Chris