Calling all budding DIY electricians

Yes, you have a triphasé supply, & a tri chauffe eau. The item to the right of the 4 pole breaker is the contactor that engages when your meter (or in this case the box you are querying below) receives the signal to switch to “Heures Creuses”. “0” is permanantly off, “Auto” is to only run on HC & “I” is to force the chauffe eau on during “Heures Pleines” (it will reset to Auto once HC kicks in i.e. it doesn’t force it on 24/7)

The GRT 15 is the receiver for the HC/HP signal. Since the advent of electronic meters these are redundant. It will be removed when your Linky is fitted.

It’s the main disjoncteur d’bonnement. This restricts the power available to the subscription that you pay for (e.g. 6kVA, 9kVA etc.). Once your Linky is in place it will be set to maximum & the power restricton will be handled by the meter instead. It’s other function is that of a 500mA différentiel, which is a backstop for safety. To protect humans properly against serious shock you require 30mA différentiels across all final circuits; these are entirely lacking from your tableau.

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Thanks very much, Badger. Supplementary Q’s. 1] What are ‘Heures Creuses’ and ‘Heures Pleine’?

How would these 30mA différentiels be incorporated in this set-up? And what are they - mini breakers?

yours with thanks, M. Ignorance Profond

PS. Does it mean a complete new/supplementary breaker board with one of these per ‘original’ breaker?
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Think of it as the same as Economy 7.

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Heures Creuses = 8 hours of cheaper rate electricity per day(about a third off the rate for the other 16 hours).
Heures Pleines = those other 16 hours, charged at slightly higher rate than the “base tarif” paid by those with only one rate.
The standing charge is slightly higher for an HC/HP abonnement.
https://particulier.edf.fr/content/dam/2-Actifs/Documents/Offres/Grille_prix_Tarif_Bleu.pdf

You require one interrupteur différentiel (ID) for every 8 (max.) final circuits. These each occupy two module spaces in your board (for single phase circuits) or 3 or 4 for triphasé circuits (please ignore the UK device that you have linked to as it would not be acceptable in France).
As you have 19 single phase circuits in your board you will require 3 single phase IDs & one triphasé to run the water heater. Space would be getting tight in your three row board after that (& a triphasé ID is expensive). It may be worthwhile converting to a single phase supply & converting the chauffe eau to single phase.

Tanks Badger …Yes …Just there as illustration to check if I was thinking about the right animal.

Would that be big deal, practically and financially? I presume that would mean replacing everything on the present board with new? From the Linky on …

One thing about France worse than UK. Needs a total, modern, rewire to be safest - next to doing it to UK standard of course!

Tri to mono cost is standard charge by ENEDIS - you get that from them. They change the meter & the “disjoncteur d’abonnement”, nothing else (unless their incoming supply cable needs uprating). You have to ensure that the rest of the installation is converted where needs be. There’s a lot of useable bits in your board but what rat’s nest of wiring is under those covers can only be guessed at. Converting from tri can be fraught with problems due to shared neutral issues.

Thanks again Badger.

Labels stuck on the breaker units tell of them being fitted 30/03/10. Is that recent enough to expect an installation still within the bounds of modern practice?

I know this question will produce the traditional sucking thru’ the teeth noise but what course of action woud you recommend, bearing in mind money IS an object but I don’t want to live with an installation which is actually dangerous.

Taped together??? Seriously? It’s normally a plastic bar but overload on any phase has to reliably trip the lot so if it is tape (hard to tell) it needs to be replaced anyway.

It’s clear the installation doesn’t meet current normes. Things are often “grandfathered” though so the original stuff only has to meet he normes in force at the time of installation.

Ah, I suspect I might be foul of that - I installed an new DD for the new circuits that I added but didn’t think to check if the original arrangement was OK so, apart from changing the ID for one which actually worked I left it as it was. It wasn’t identified as a problem in the DDT (that is, the fact that it did not trip was identified, but not the fact that it might be feeding too many circuits).

Trouble is that will need a new tableau

Another job for the lilst.

Good morning Billy.

Not taped. I zoomed in on a hi-res original of the photo and it seems to be some sort of plastic sleeve - tube-like, with a slit thru’ which each switch passes into the tube, slid along/over the switches.

I don’t understand these in your notes - DD, DDT, tableau [in this context]…

What I find puzzling is that there are ‘anomalies’ pointed out, [tho’ only three are specifically identified with a note and a photo] but unlike a vehicle MoT, for example, there is nothing by way of mandatory action to be taken or even ‘advisories’. What is pointed out, in a table at the end, is the possible consequences of failure or lack of an approved protective device or installation. Fire or death by lekky, basically.

Is this a reflection of the ‘grandfathering’’ effect? If this is so, from the p.o.v. of the Inspectorate, it is not required that householder carry out any particular action but the consequences of inaction might be reflected in the outcome of an insurance claim - or the aforementioned death.

So the choice is between only replacing this, and the other two similar, with something pukka

or doing a full-on rewire from the meter on. Or something in between.

It doesn’t seem sensible to do nothing but the three noted anomalies and I can’t afford a total rewire. As you seem engaged in an overhaul of your own system, I’d be grateful if you could make a suggestion as to how you would proceed and what to prioritise.

DD - disjoncteur differential (equivalent of an RCBO in the UK - residual current *and* overload protection).

DDT = dossier diagnostique technique

Tableau - consumer unit.

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captainendeavour let me have a look at some more of the report - seems there are whole circuits with no earth, and 3-pin sockets with the earth left unconnected. Ouch.

The problem with using any of the existing wiring is that it clearly all needs checking - there’s a lot of “at least one” in the report, well that could be 2 circuits with 10 more that are OK or it could be problems with every circuit in the house. My spider sense is leaning the latter direction.

By the time you have spent time an effort checking what can be rescued/reused to discover “not much” it would have been cheaper to start again in the first place.

Thanks Billy. I wonder if the anomalies re earthing and earth pins [apart from the lack of bonding in the shower] are ‘bundled’ in the three items he’s picked out and photographed. Ditto the lack of conduit and the 15mm patrasse.

There’s the one above - the socket - which I believe is in one of the bedrooms in the house … and this

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and this, seen also in a later pic
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Clearly, the outdoor socket with no RCD is this [my photo]
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Apart from the points you and Badger make about aspects of the fuse board/consumer unit array and bathroom bonding, my suspicion is that the problems you mention are mainly, if not all associated with this building [I call it the bothy - a Scottish word for a shepherd’s refuge] and the atelier
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which both show every sign of having been knocked together by the original owner. He had the house built to current regs [then the windows all x2 glazed but not so recently as to contain nitogen in the gap] then put these two up himself, complete with DIY non-spec electrics.

I bet that :

At least one socket outlet has an earth pin which is not connected to earth.
At least one CIRCUIT (not supplying socket outlets) is not earthed.
Plus, we know it is “at least one” circuit - so each will need checking/re-doing. The cross-section of the EARTH CONDUCTOR of at least one CIRCUIT is insufficient. So, where there is an earth it is not adequate and needs to be a heavier cable.
Old electrical equipment, unsuitable for use The installation includes at least one dilapidated ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT. [See photo of thing tacked to a bit of wood]
Au moins un CONDUCTEUR isolé n’est pas placé sur toute sa longueur dans un conduit, une goulotte, une plinthe ou une huisserie, en matière isolante ou métallique, jusqu’à sa pénétration dans le MATERIEL ELECTRIQUE qu’il alimente.

are all in the bothy, apart from the photo of the adhoc extension socket seen against wallpaper with rural scenes in red. That’s in a bedroom in the house.

Judging by the stuff in the cave and in the atelier, he was a bit of a demon DIYist, and I bet all the wiring in the bothy and the atelier are his. It all looks home-made - the walls, the window frames, the outside shutters - the lot.

and the atelier

The shower is something I intend to completely refurb anyway.

As you say, the phrase “au moins…” is clearly the default ‘Get out of jail’ formula to cover
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It is always more convenient and often cheaper to start again from scratch. I did this in my flat in Valencia but that was made easier by the fact that I had all the walls replastered, new ceilings [all false ceilings so running cable couldn’t have been easier] as well. And I had the budget!

This one has to be played very carefully, financially.

I’m 72. That’s why I’ve ‘taken a view’ about the asbestos content of roof tiles and wall panels - standard for 1958 - and the radon gas. Vire is set on granite.

If I don’t mess with the roof or the exterior walls and the floor is gas proof [laminate over tiles over timber over an underbuild and open the windows to let the gas out (advice from the estate agent!)] those shouldn’t be a problem for me.

But I would like to do the best I can afford on the lekky. It’s disappointing that the ‘anomalies’ are not described in more detail. All the ‘localisation’ boxes are blank. Why are they there? That’s pretty poor.

I think perhaps an analysis broken into in 3 parts - 1/ the main board, 2/ the house sockets and wiring, and 3/ the bothy/atelier sockets and wiring. And likewise, renovations in stages.

Time for a cup of tea! My
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is going square!

I’m wondering how the “expertise” DDT or whatever… managed to avoid suggesting that the whole thing should be replaced… (or did it and was that bit lost in the translation…??)

It’s a shame this DDT was not checked/discussed before the Sale/Purchase as the costs for putting right would have been worth negotiating…

best of luck…

Not so much that - it’s only a report for a dossier diagnostique, not a full electrical report - so once you’ve found one problem in a particular category no need to continue looking for more, just move onto the next category.

Well, it was on for €96.5k in 2020, it was one of the first on my faves list back in +/- March at €86.5k and they accepted an offer of €76.5k in mid July with no further ado. Clearly I should have tried €66.5k first!

Then there might have been some negotiating…

Tax had either been paid or was due, so the sellers - twins of 62 y.o and a brother of 59 - were keen to recoup or get the tax paid.

The furniture is on Leboncoin for silly prices. They are trying to make up for the price of the house!
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There’s one almost identical on for €40 - no mattress. Several others with very good mattresses for €100, which is what I offered but was turned down.

And this bizarre object. A dishwasher with a 4-burner gas hob built in to the top. I’ve never seen one before. Yours for €250 … :thinking::laughing:
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Ah… if you’ve acquired the house at a cheaper price anyway… you might be best advised to get the electrics professionally done.
At least you’ll have the guarantee to fall back on. (seen a place burn to the ground, after the electrics were done by a “handy” Brit to save money - no insurance of course… ).

Seen plenty of houses burned out round abouts and a Brit has never been anywhere near them, not even for aperos

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Indeed, unlike the comment by one of our SF bretheren that ‘only the French pay RRP’ I know my way around a price negotiation.

In my location research days I came across the ideal location for a cement mixer truck photograph - very exciting, the advertising biz - the M4/M25 interchange.

At the time it was the biggest civil engineering project in Europe. Not only a massive m/way interchange but the diversion of a river and of a railway.

I managed to get to see the site manager. He agreed we could have a muddy corner somewhere out of the way and “How about £2500 ?” I explained that this was not Hollywood but soot-and-whitewash in “Your Cement Mixer” magazine [or somesuch]

“Well. What do you usually pay?”
“£250”
" :astonished: … that is a figure so small that to me it is invisible - but it’ll go nicely into the men’s Christmas Lunch fund - done"

My dad had a brilliant way with buying cars at a discount. He would go for a drive in the car of his choice - aways the top of the line, the demo cars - and back at the dealership he would say, “Very nice … how much for this one?” [Taxed. Full of gas … cunning old dad. ]They always sold.

Sounds as if you’ll have no problem negotiating the right price, for a Registered (Insured) Electrician to do the necessary electrical work for you… :hugs: