Not only tradesmen. People aren't as bright as they should be.
short wires
- Thread starter Rob Mon
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- socket replacement
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In my mothers house the electricians cut all the conductors to exactly the right length to just reach each terminal, even though they used deep metal boxes. The conductors are so short you can only release the plate away from the box by around 10mm. It must have been so much work to connect them, having only just enough space to fit a screwdriver between the plate and the box. Every socket in the house is connected in the same way. The sockets are 45 year old MK ones so only a few have needed to be replaced.
Thanks for all your help guys. Yes the wires are sheathed but they come in from the top and there is NO slack at all. I could just about get the screwdriver in to reach the terminals to take the old one off and there is no chance of installing the new one without joining the wires. I will do as you suggested by taking the two live, two neutral and two earths into terminal blocks and then a single wire back out to the new socket.
Thanks again. Rob
Thanks again. Rob
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I knew a bloke who used to do £250 rewires in the mid eighties. Real tightwad.
He would put one socket in each room (where he wanted to put them), replace the light fittings in their original positions and a 4 way Wylex 3036 (1 RFC whole house, 1 lighting circuit whole house, 1 cooker circuit and 1 immersion).
He used to use Ashley sockets and they would be crammed in to 16mm boxes, because they were cheaper. He also used to try and save more cable by wiring up the sockets, screwing them into place then pulling back the cable under the floor, leaving absolutely no slack; this way, he didn't struggle as you suggest, Freddo.
He would put one socket in each room (where he wanted to put them), replace the light fittings in their original positions and a 4 way Wylex 3036 (1 RFC whole house, 1 lighting circuit whole house, 1 cooker circuit and 1 immersion).
He used to use Ashley sockets and they would be crammed in to 16mm boxes, because they were cheaper. He also used to try and save more cable by wiring up the sockets, screwing them into place then pulling back the cable under the floor, leaving absolutely no slack; this way, he didn't struggle as you suggest, Freddo.
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That was cheap even then. A lot cheaper than I'd want to have done it. Used to come across that sort of work sometimes, invariably with "No mark" cable, and those Far Eastern fittings, whose name eludes me, but I used to get regular work changing them when they failed.
We were taught to cut the cable and wires off "to size", but experience would say that if you can leave a bit of extra in either then it makes it a lot easier for somebody coming along later on.
If I come to second fix, I try and leave as much slack as is possible (without it looking gash of course) and even first fixing, if a spotlight cable is too long, or a switch drop is too long, it just gets tidily looped up in the ceiling. Cutting it off achieves nothing, but if somebody comes along in 20 years or whatever (could even be me!) and there's enough slack for what they need to do, then happy days.
Presumably no EIC.
I think that guy rewired my mother's house too.
They did a rewire on our council house in the 1960s that was a similar job. They supposedly were replacing the original 30s rubber cable which was by that time well perished, but with absolute minimum sockets and so on. Dad was peeved because he was a sparks himself, and had already rewired it ("illegally" as far as the council was concerned) with new cable, extra sockets and a new consumer unit, and they came and replaced all his work with less sockets and so on. Funny once they cleared off it all went back to how it had been with various curses about "so called electricians" from my dad.
Dads first rewire was prompted by the fact that the wiring was knackered to the point of being dangerous, and they wouldn't do anything "proper" about it to start with. They did send someone to replace the old round switches with Crabtree ones of similar type. I remember because I was at home, I must have been eleven or twelve, and I asked the chap doing the work why the little "C" on all the toggles was upside down.
He said they were supposed to be like that!
Dads first rewire was prompted by the fact that the wiring was knackered to the point of being dangerous, and they wouldn't do anything "proper" about it to start with. They did send someone to replace the old round switches with Crabtree ones of similar type. I remember because I was at home, I must have been eleven or twelve, and I asked the chap doing the work why the little "C" on all the toggles was upside down.
He said they were supposed to be like that!
The council never change. At a local property they did a 'full inspection and test' according to what they had written on the test sticker on the db. They somehow did it in less than 20 minutes, and without switching off the supply to the socket circuit!
The neon screwdriver won't light if they turn off the juice. . .
Its more often than not DIYers and other trades 'doing their own electrical work' that leave them too short to change sockets brands IMHO, because they can't dress the cores in properly
Maybe - but one would have thought that that whoever was doing it would have the common sense to realise the desirability of sensible length conductors - it hardly needs any 'training' to understand that!
Kind Regards, John
Often common sense is so rare it's like a superpower.
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