 You don't need to be an 'investor' to invest in Singletrack: 6 days left: 95% of target - Find out more
How come sparkies are not required to label up wiring (other than at the consumer unit)?
I've been looking at the mass of wiring all over the place in the house, and a simple label on the wiring to determine the circuit and install date would have made life easier. Where I'm replacing things at the access points I'm taking 30secs to write the install date and circuit on the most visible bit of wire with a sharpie. Why is this not a thing sparkies do? Is it because they just want everyone to do a full rip out and rewire rather than be able to easily identify and modify circuits?
Plus, how come there is not a requirement for circuit diagrams to be created to meet regs for modifications? I have just started researching free software to let me do this, it really shouldn't take that long to do - say an hour? And it would be a massive help to any new owner (and my memory)
Any suggestions for software? Edraw looks ok...
experiance has taught me not to trust anything written on anything thats put together by humans that were not me.
it usually hurts and then adds to the confusion.
True, I would never take it as gospel but it would give a fan good idea of the start point.
How come sparkies are not required to label up wiring (other than at the consumer unit)?
Because it probably just leads to a false sense of security. Something is labelled DS Ring, so you switch off the fuse for DS Ring and falsely assume it's been isolated.
However, I do write on each cable with permanent marker, what it is whenever I have the opportunity.
[url= https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5575/14732564047_15912a8dda.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5575/14732564047_15912a8dda.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/orSf1X ]Wood worm damaged joists[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/brf/ ]Ben Freeman[/url], on Flickr
Is it because they just want everyone to do a full rip out and rewire rather than be able to easily identify and modify circuits?
It's not that hard to identify circuits in reality. The cable size gives you a pretty good idea 95% of the time...
Plus isolating a circuit takes a minute. You plug in a tester plug with a constant tone and flip the fuses till you hear the tone stop....
That is exactly how I'm doing it, with the addition of the date.
It isn't that tough to work out the wiring now I'm quite a few hours / days / weeks into pulling up boards and trying to work out what on earth has been going on. I'm fairly confident I've worked out most of runs.
I'm now down to trying to track down where the boiler and central heating pumps and joined up with the upstairs ring. I'm presuming its a spur of some description but its not off any of the sockets, so must be a junction box probably under the landing floor somewhere hidden.
experiance has taught me not to trust anything written on anything thats put together by humans that were not me.
This. It might help you with your wiring, but nobody else would rely on it because it might be wrong, or it might have changed over time. "Oh, this says it's the xxx so I'll just flip that breaker and get to work, oohyah zzzzzzfizzlezap"
If you are working on something, identify the circuit yourself to be sure. If you put it in and nobody else has changed it, then that's fine.