Annoying just lost a post as I wasn't logged in...
Appliance plugged into cooker socket shows earth leak
- Thread starter bpowell555
- Start date
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Looks like 240v from the cooker and the socket. How have I never had a decent shock
Disconnected the cooker and will see if I have a spare socket to rule that out.
Disconnected the cooker and will see if I have a spare socket to rule that out.
The earth conductor is live 
The earth conductor is live
Earth at the oven live you mean?
If so, you need to look in the consumer unit, to see if the earth for the oven cable is connected in there. It might not actually be live, it might just be a bit of induced voltage on the earth wire.
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Earth into the socket is 240v, live is 240v.. I'm a bit mystified how either the fault could suddenly appear or it could have been wired like that for the last 20 years?
Just to be clear ... are they both measurements with the other probe of the meter on a water tap or somesuch?
Kind Regards, John
Yes that's right. I double checked with the cooker handle when it was connected and my finger and that was exciting.
Joined by a metal plate I would think, can't be sure if the earth sleeving is trapped under the screw on one terminal mind.
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One can't be certain, but it looks as if the two terminals are both rivited, welded or brazed to the same brass plate ...
Cheers all. Its not the socket, I swapped it and the faceplate (metal) was live. Turned out was the earth conductor. Could be the sleeve or damaged live or fault in the CU or elsewhere in the cable.... Will check a few more things later this afternoon but all off for now. Microwave dinners it is!
I presume by a "cooker socket" you mean the socket on a cooker control unit e.g.
It's not impossible that the socket itself is faulty or that some numpty wired it in a way that passes the earth through to the cooker but does not connect it to the cooker control unit.
but it's IMO far more likely that the earth wire has either fallen out or was never connected in the first place. In that case it would indeed affect both the cooker and the socket.
I'd start by looking behind the cooker control unit, then if I didn't find any faults there I would move on to looking in the consumer unit.
This. I was think control unit was CCU or connection unit but I should have been calling the "socket" the control unit
Small update. Cut the cable before the socket to see if it was bad behind the tiles and unfortunately not so the problem is further upstream. If earth is live surely it must not be correctly connected to the CU? Or is that not true. I can't see anything obviously wrong in the CU short of disconnecting everything to find which is the right cable. I guess I'd need to run a length of flex to the other end to confirm that and I don't think I have 10m knocking around. Might head to B&Q...
The cooker cable in the CU will be obvious by its size and which breaker it goes to.
I know the breaker but the cu is a mess, I'll post a pic and hunt the earth and neutral tomorrow.
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