harmonised cables

[ColJack]

this is going to leave a nasty taste in my mouth, but I agree with Goldberg on this one..

if it's unreasonable to knowingly mix colours when you don't have to, then why don't they still make red and black for use when making additionds or alterations to old installations that still have the majority of the wiring in the old colours..?

 

[Chri5]

this is going to leave a nasty taste in my mouth, but I agree with Goldberg on this one..

if it's unreasonable to knowingly mix colours when you don't have to, then why don't they still make red and black for use when making additionds or alterations to old installations that still have the majority of the wiring in the old colours..?

because the part P police would be able to catch anyone out, since all DIY work would then be done in old colours

 

[ColJack]

there was an overlap in the time the old colours were faded out and when Part-P came in so the presence of old colours does not automatically mean it was done pre- part P anyway..

 

[Chri5]

CJ as we move further away from the old colour period 2004/5 end of supply the overlap shrinks with regard to validity of your statement.

Say in 2012 you see a job that is clearly newer than 2004/5 run in old wire won't you think that someone was trying to hoodwink the system ?

 

[ColJack]

how can you say that it was newer than 2004/5 without dated evidence to proove it?

granted if it's a CU change then most of the plastic ones have the date embossed into the moulding, but you can't proove that the cable wasn't already there and that the CU was changed..

 

[Chri5]

No you can't prove it.

But as time marches on it will be far more obvious as to an installation being genuinely old or a new job with old colour cabling.

Old red / black will in 15-20 years be seen as the black sheathed TE of the moment. Eventually it will be visual evidence that the shelf life of the system is near its sell by date.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Precisely correct, but this is merely the starting point, and it's abundantly clear that "reasonable" is not defined, so this isn't a black and white situation.

Indeed not, but I did say "IMO mixing old and new colours when it is reasonable not to is illegal".

Using mixed colours makes an installation more hazardous to people maintaining or altering it, if it did not then there would be no need for a notice drawing peoples' attention to it and advising them to take great care that they haven't misidentified a conductor.

I completely concur with this.

Good, because it is the hazards arising from mixing colour systems which is the important issue here.

So by deliberately using mixed colours when it was reasonable for you not to have done so means that you have deliberately and unreasonably done something which makes it more dangerous to persons maintaining or altering the installation.

I disagree with this.

In some situations using old colours is the more reasonable action.

As I have argued several times - using old colours to avoid mixing colour schemes is the more reasonable thing to do.

For example, if the overwhelming majority of cabling in an installation is of the old colouring, and if adding new colours increases the opportunity to become confused, then it (adding) would be the wrong thing to do, on the grounds that decreasing confusion is the objective.

And (putting aside the subjective nature of "reasonable") like you I believe that if it is reasonable to use the old colours (i.e. if you have reasonable access to them) when adding cables to an old colour installation then you should do it, and it would be unreasonable not to.

Conversely, if the overwhelming majority of cabling in an installation is of the new colouring, and if adding old colours increases the opportunity to become confused, then it (adding) would be the wrong thing to do, on the grounds that decreasing confusion is the objective.

The OP is wiring a new build started in 2008, so my assumption (which was a reasonable one, IMO) was that all of the wiring would have been in harmonised colours except for the 2-way strapper(s) where he introduced non-harmonised cable.

So what he has done is to increase the opportunity to become confused.

Whether or not to use old colours is best decided after fully thinking about the relative merit(s) and danger(s) of doing it.

Indeed, and I can see no merits whatsoever in using a few bits of old colours in a new build which is otherwise wired entirely in new colours.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

this is going to leave a nasty taste in my mouth, but I agree with Goldberg on this one..

And he agrees with me.....

if it's unreasonable to knowingly mix colours when you don't have to, then why don't they still make red and black for use when making additionds or alterations to old installations that still have the majority of the wiring in the old colours..?

You can still get red & black singles.

I guess the market for red/black T/E would be too small to reasonably expect manufacturers to carry on making it, and to expect distributors, wholesalers and retailers to increase their storage spaces.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

And as for the Part P issue, we weren't the only country to make changes, and I find it hard to believe that an international harmonisation committee was set up in order to make contraventions of UK Building Regulations easier to detect.

It wouldn't have worked anyway - even if the dates had coincided we would soon be (if we aren't there already) in the situation where mixed colours would be such a common state of affairs, and so many people would have moved houses, that the adding of more harmonised alterations to an installation wouldn't trigger any particular suspicions.

 

[Goldberg]

Precisely correct, but this is merely the starting point, and it's abundantly clear that "reasonable" is not defined, so this isn't a black and white situation.

Indeed not, but I did say "IMO mixing old and new colours when it is reasonable not to is illegal".

IMO, you're right.

Using mixed colours makes an installation more hazardous to people maintaining or altering it, if it did not then there would be no need for a notice drawing peoples' attention to it and advising them to take great care that they haven't misidentified a conductor.

I completely concur with this.

Good, because it is the hazards arising from mixing colour systems which is the important issue here.

I completely concur with that too.

In some situations using old colours is the more reasonable action.

As I have argued several times - using old colours to avoid mixing colour schemes is the more reasonable thing to do.

I submit that I wasn't aware of those several occasions, so had no intention of giving an egg-sucking teach-in.

And (putting aside the subjective nature of "reasonable") like you I believe that if it is reasonable to use the old colours (i.e. if you have reasonable access to them) when adding cables to an old colour installation then you should do it, and it would be unreasonable not to.

The OP is wiring a new build started in 2008, so my assumption (which was a reasonable one, IMO) was that all of the wiring would have been in harmonised colours except for the 2-way strapper(s) where he introduced non-harmonised cable.

So what he has done is to increase the opportunity to become confused.

I agree completely.

Whether or not to use old colours is best decided after fully thinking about the relative merit(s) and danger(s) of doing it.

Indeed, and I can see no merits whatsoever in using a few bits of old colours in a new build which is otherwise wired entirely in new colours.

I couldn't agree more. At least, not without appearing sycophantic. And that simply wouldn't do.

 

[Paul_C]

There is no difference in putting sleeves on blue cable to show it is used for line as to putting same sleeve on a red cable to show it is used for line. Yes it would not be permitted to sleeve the black of a pair with brown and leave the red as is but to sleeve them both must be OK. Otherwise the whole idea of using sleeves on cables coloured for three phase would also be outlawed.

Indeed. The current Regs. simply require the conductors (on a single-phase installation) to be identified brown or blue as appropriate at their terminations. The original color of the conductor is immaterial.

How is using brown sleeves on the red, yellow or blue of "old" cable any different from using brown sleeves on the black or gray of the new cable? Or how is it any different from using a blue sleeve on the gray of a new 3+E cable to use it as a neutral?

The only reidentification which is not permitted by the Regs. is of a green/yellow conductor. It is permissible to put green/yellow sleeving on a brown/black/gray/other conductor to use it as an earth, but it is not permitted to sleeve a green/yellow conductor with any other color to use it as anything but an earth.

Also BS7671:2008 is not law.

No, but the Building Regulations are.

P1 requires that reasonable provision shall be made in the design and installation of electrical installations in order to protect persons operating, maintaining or altering the installations from fire or injury.

And the Approved Document for Part P, while not law either, specifically states that compliance with BS7671 is to be accepted as one method of showing compliance with the Building Regs. (not the only method).

Red/yellow/blue sleeved brown at the terminations is fully compliant with the current edition of BS7671, so by the government's own guidelines in the Approved Document, is to be considered as being compliant with the Building Regs. Part P.

there was an overlap in the time the old colours were faded out and when Part-P came in so the presence of old colours does not automatically mean it was done pre- part P anyway..

And conversely, the presence of brown/black/gray/blue does not prove that the installation was done post-Part P.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

And the Approved Document for Part P, while not law either, specifically states that compliance with BS7671 is to be accepted as one method of showing compliance with the Building Regs. (not the only method).

Indeed.

Maybe it was just an assumption that compliance with BS 7671 would have been the way that the OP voluntarily chose to use as his way to comply with P1, but was it an unreasonable one to make?

Red/yellow/blue sleeved brown at the terminations is fully compliant with the current edition of BS7671, so by the government's own guidelines in the Approved Document, is to be considered as being compliant with the Building Regs. Part P.

It may be compliant with BS 7671, but it is deprecated.

And it does bring with it a requirement for a warning notice, which proves that it is considered more hazardous than not doing it. If it was reasonable for the OP to have not mixed colour schemes and he nevertheless deliberately chose to mix them then what he did was to unreasonably and deliberately introduce a hazard, and therefore IMO he cannot be said to have made reasonable provision in the design and installation of his work in order to protect persons maintaining or altering the installation from fire or injury.

 

[Paul_C]

Maybe it was just an assumption that compliance with BS 7671 would have been the way that the OP voluntarily chose to use as his way to comply with P1, but was it an unreasonable one to make?

No, but as you acknoweldged, red/yellow/blue conductors sleeved brown does comply with the current edition of BS7671 (assuming all used as lives, of course).

It may be compliant with BS 7671, but it is deprecated.

And it does bring with it a requirement for a warning notice, which proves that it is considered more hazardous than not doing it.

Does it? The addition of new brown/blue wiring to an existing installation which already has red/black in use requires a warning notice, but I would not interpret that as meaning that the notice is required if all conductors are identified at their terminations by the new scheme.

If you happen to use some old red/black but sleeve it brown/blue at the terminations on a job which has otherwise been completed in brown/blue cable throughout, does that constitute two different sets of color codes being used? If so, then how do you account for using brown/black/gray SWA to feed a garage, for example, where two of the conductors will need to be sleeved at terminations?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

No, but as you acknoweldged, red/yellow/blue conductors sleeved brown does comply with the current edition of BS7671 (assuming all used as lives, of course).

Yes, but 514.3.2 says you should preferably not do it

It may be compliant with BS 7671, but it is deprecated.

And it does bring with it a requirement for a warning notice, which proves that it is considered more hazardous than not doing it.

Does it?

Which? bring a requirement, or prove it's considered more hazardous?

I'll answer both.

Yes. See 514.14.1
Yes. If not, there would be no requirement for a warning notice.

The addition of new brown/blue wiring to an existing installation which already has red/black in use requires a warning notice, but I would not interpret that as meaning that the notice is required if all conductors are identified at their terminations by the new scheme.

If you happen to use some old red/black but sleeve it brown/blue at the terminations on a job which has otherwise been completed in brown/blue cable throughout, does that constitute two different sets of color codes being used?

It may not contravene 514.3.2 but it is stated as not preferred.

If so, then how do you account for using brown/black/gray SWA to feed a garage, for example, where two of the conductors will need to be sleeved at terminations?

That's not the same thing at all - brown/black/grey in a harmonised installation conforms 100% to the colour code, just as R/Y/B did pre-harmonisation.

The use of some of the conductors for N or E does not follow the preference stated in 514.3.2, but there is a reasonable justification for that; it would not be reasonable to use 5-core SWA for the garage, and it would not be possible to use any other type of flat-PVC with cpc for 2-way switching or fan wiring etc.

But deliberately choosing to go against the preference in 514.3.2 when there is no justification whatsoever is a different matter. It means you have deliberately done something that the regulations say you should not do for no valid reason at all.

I don't think that counts as being good workmanship or proper materials, and therefore contravenes 134.1.1.

And therefore I believe that deliberately introducing mixed colours when you have no reasonable excuse makes your work non-compliant with BS 7671.

 

[Paul_C]

Which? bring a requirement, or prove it's considered more hazardous?

I'll answer both.

Yes. See 514.14.1

I was thinking of the warning notice specifically. 514.14.1:

If wiring additions or alterations are made to an installation such that some of the wiring complies with Regulation 514.4 but there is also wiring to previous versions of these Regulations, a warning notice shall be affixed at or near the appropriate distribution board.....

If you use brown sleeves on red/yellow/blue, then the wiring complies with 514.4, and would not comply with earlier versions, so I can't see how 514.14.1 would require a warning notice in those circumstances.

514.4 - like the equivalent rules for many years before - states that conductors must be identified at their terminations, but only preferably throughout their length.

If so, then how do you account for using brown/black/gray SWA to feed a garage, for example, where two of the conductors will need to be sleeved at terminations?

That's not the same thing at all - brown/black/grey in a harmonised installation conforms 100% to the colour code, just as R/Y/B did pre-harmonisation.

Brown/black/gray does not conform 100% to the current system if one core is to be used as a neutral and another as earth, which is why two of the cores will need to be reidentified at their terminations. If you used "old" red/yellow/blue SWA in the same application today, you could comply with the current requirements of BS7671 by using the blue as neutral, sleeving the red with brown for line and the yellow with green/yellow for earth.

The use of some of the conductors for N or E does not follow the preference stated in 514.3.2, but there is a reasonable justification for that; it would not be reasonable to use 5-core SWA for the garage, and it would not be possible to use any other type of flat-PVC with cpc for 2-way switching or fan wiring etc.

But deliberately choosing to go against the preference in 514.3.2 when there is no justification whatsoever is a different matter. It means you have deliberately done something that the regulations say you should not do for no valid reason at all.

So by that argument, it's not compliant to use brown/blue T&E for a switch drop with brown sleeving on the blue, since it's possible to obtain T&E with two brown cores.