Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?

--
Dave - The Medway Handyman

Tim+ wrote:

I thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.
Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer.

My Kewstick Uno detects normal flex as live from any angle/orientation,
it detects arctic flex as live *unless* you have the tip directly over
the earth core with the tool perpendicular to the cable, but it will
*not* detect any live indication whatsoever from 2.5mm^2 SWA.

On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour. I'm not too surprised that they don't
detect live SWA cable, especially at any distance. However a good "metal
detector" ought to work, also consider a rare earth magnet which (I
guess) might pick it up through up to a centimetre of plaster, but
probably not much further.

David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim

On 3/18/2016 7:13 PM, Tim+ wrote:
David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim


Copper sheathed mineral insulated cable is fairly common, but I've never
seen any big enough to be mistaken for a gas or water pipe. Still I
suppose this was supplying 240 or 300 amps.

Certainly providing mechanical protection, but I wouldn't call it
"armoured".

"Tim+" wrote in message ...



I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim

I bet that made a bit of a pop !

Andrew

On Friday, 18 March 2016 18:31:14 UTC, Tim+ wrote:

Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

Mine uses capacitive pickup, so any earthed metal stops the signal.

8 hours is a long time.


NT

Andrew Mawson wrote:
"Tim+" wrote in message ...



I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim

I bet that made a bit of a pop !

Ruined my drill bit. ;-) Underwear escaped serious damage though.

Tim

wrote:
On Friday, 18 March 2016 18:31:14 UTC, Tim+ wrote:

Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

Mine uses capacitive pickup, so any earthed metal stops the signal.

8 hours is a long time.

It was probably longer. Certainly long enough for the electric company to
rig up a temporary supply.

Of course if the main fuse hadn't been hidden behind a plasterboard
partition behind a radiator they might have found it a bit quicker. ;-)

Tim

In article ,
newshound wrote:
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here
recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

MICC?

--
from KT24 in Surrey, England

Tim+ a écrit :
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

The will not pick up the field through metal of any type. That includes
metal screening, armouring, conduit and etc..

To help prevent your drilling an hidden amoured cable, metal pipe or
similar buried in a wall, a metal detector works well.

I'd not think copper was much goosed for armouring a cable though.

Brian

--
----- -
This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...

Blind user, so no pictures please!
"Tim+" wrote in message
...
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

Yes, one should be able to use a metal detector to find something in a wall?
Brian

--
----- -
This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...

Blind user, so no pictures please!
"David Lang" wrote in message
...
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours
I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?

--
Dave - The Medway Handyman

In article ,
charles writes:
In article ,
newshound wrote:
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here
recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

MICC?

Also it's used with cables which don't have balanced feed/return current
such as 11kV singles, although it's really there to generate an earth
leakage if the cable is damaged, and is much thinner than steel armour
wires. Hopefully you don't have any concealed 11kV wires in the wall!

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

In article ,
Tim+ writes:
Andrew Mawson wrote:
"Tim+" wrote in message ...



I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim

I bet that made a bit of a pop !

Ruined my drill bit. ;-) Underwear escaped serious damage though.

Was it an ordinary coppr pipe, or was it a mineral insulated cable
full of compressed white magnesium oxide power as the insulator)?

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

On Fri, 18 Mar 2016 19:04:33 +0000, newshound wrote:

On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here
recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector
would be better?


Never heard of copper armour. I'm not too surprised that they don't
detect live SWA cable, especially at any distance. However a good "metal
detector" ought to work, also consider a rare earth magnet which (I
guess) might pick it up through up to a centimetre of plaster, but
probably not much further.

I do recall a Mr. Terry P mentioning standing outside in a thunderstorm in
wet copper armour shouting "All Gods are *******s!" but this probably does
not relate to your issue :-)



--
Windows 8.1 on PCSpecialist box

Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article ,
Tim+ writes:
Andrew Mawson wrote:
"Tim+" wrote in message ...



I wasn't intending using it as a cable detector. My folly was to drill
(deliberately) into an old copper pipe to determine whether it was gas or
water (having turned off both first) prior to removing the "pipe". I forgot
the third option. ;-)

Tim

I bet that made a bit of a pop !

Ruined my drill bit. ;-) Underwear escaped serious damage though.

Was it an ordinary coppr pipe, or was it a mineral insulated cable
full of compressed white magnesium oxide power as the insulator)?


The latter, although to a fool it looked awfully like an old copper pipe.
;-)

Tim

Harry Bloomfield wrote:
Tim+ a écrit :
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8 hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

The will not pick up the field through metal of any type. That includes
metal screening, armouring, conduit and etc..

To help prevent your drilling an hidden amoured cable, metal pipe or
similar buried in a wall, a metal detector works well.


Ah but it wasn't hidden. I just needed more nous. ;-)

Tim

"newshound" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

Most houses built since the late 60s have an incoming supply that uses
copper armour.

--
Adam

On 2016-03-20 17:08:53 +0000, ARW said:

"newshound" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

Most houses built since the late 60s have an incoming supply that uses
copper armour

I have never (until now) heard of the outer conductor in a concentric
cable being called armour. To my mind it is just a concentric
conductor.

On 20/03/16 17:08, ARW wrote:
"newshound" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here
recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

Most houses built since the late 60s have an incoming supply that uses
copper armour.


Wrong.
They use steel armour. Copper is not an 'armour'


--
Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have
guns, why should we let them have ideas?

Josef Stalin

"The Natural Philosopher" wrote in message
...
On 20/03/16 17:08, ARW wrote:
"newshound" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/18/2016 6:44 PM, David Lang wrote:
On 18/03/2016 18:28, Tim+ wrote:
Following an episode of depriving three flats of mains power for 8
hours I
thought I'd buy some of those cheap volt sticks mentioned here
recently.

Seem to work fine on ordinary cable but not on my armoured incomer. I
suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this but clearly they're not gonna
stop
me drilling into another armoured cable. ;-)

Out of interest, would the type of armour make a difference (say steel
versus copper)?

Tim

They aren't meant to be cable detectors. Surely a proper detector
would
be better?


Never heard of copper armour.

Most houses built since the late 60s have an incoming supply that uses
copper armour.


Wrong.
They use steel armour. Copper is not an 'armour'


Yes. Point noted and I was wrong with what I said.

It was more to say to newshound (and other posters) that there are cables
with copper not steel "outers" that look like SWA. The clue being in the use
of the letters SWA.

Cheers


--
Adam

On 2016-03-20, ARW wrote:

"The Natural Philosopher" wrote in message
...
On 20/03/16 17:08, ARW wrote:

Most houses built since the late 60s have an incoming supply that uses
copper armour.


Wrong.
They use steel armour. Copper is not an 'armour'


Yes. Point noted and I was wrong with what I said.

You're not doing this internet argument thing right!
;-)