I thought there was at least the recommendation that if the earth pin is at the top live should be on the right looking into the socket?
Of course, now I know that the brown banana plug connects to the left pin I can just swap the two 4mm connections over if necessary.
It’s certainly true of the BS1363 to euro adapters which, plugged into a CEE 7/5 socket flip the UK socket upside down and will swap L&N if the live is on the right in the French socket.
Hmmm, that’s imprecise of me - it would go either way around into a German CEE 7/3 socket, it’s just that if it is plugged into a French 7/5 socket it only goes in one way, which means that the blue/brown connectors are flipped if the French socket is wired with live on the right.
in short - when working anywhere in the EU, make sure you know which pin in the socket is suppose dto be live. Equipment won’t mind, but you might be in for a surprise if you get it wrong.
I have a Linky meter, and when I recently looked at My Space on EDF’s website I was being congratulated that my current consumption was lower than normal.
I had a phone call from EDF yesterday which I didn’t answer, but I heard a robo-voice asking me to press (1) on my phone’s keypad to put me in touch with a technician.
Would I be right to ignore this (scam?) phone call? Whenever EDF gets in touch with me it’s always by email, usually to warn me that my current month’s consumption is higher than normal.
On the other hand, it might be a genuine call because I just cannot get to My Space on EDF’s website. There’s a message saying the My Space part of the site is down temporarily due to maintenance, and has been for a couple of days now.
I “made” one of those by cutting the end off the cable of a broken pond pump.
The blue was live when I tested it in a correctly wired socket (live on the right) .
I have discarded it.
I thought chauffe eaus are supposed to have their own circuit breaker? In which case the simple solution is to flip the breaker to switch it on and off and control it that way. Plug in timers are not designed for heavy duty appliances.
Very true. I had only pulled the simple fuse supplying the spur , so the live was feeding around all the neutrals. The house was built in 1930, don’t know if rewired since.
I now press the test button on the differential breaker if undertaking work.
Some are, details usually on the packet. 10 amp still good for 2400 watts so sufficient for a water heater. Some use zero volt switching which would save contacts welding together.
The best way to describe the connection is to use the standard set by CEE17 connectors & say that when viewing a female connection (i.e. a socket) the first phase is clockwise from the earth pin, & neutral (if present) is anti-clockwise.
Put another way, if you have a 3 phase, neutral & earth connector the phases are L1, L2, L3 going clockwise. If you’ve run out of pins at that point then you have a 3 phase & earth connector in your hand!
Yes, a chauffe eau (CE) or any major load is supposed run on a dedicated circuit.
In the case of a CE it must be hard wired i.e. sockets are interdit.
If one wishes to control a CE in a way other than a contactor that responds to ENEDIS’s HC signal it’s best to fit a good quality time switch in the tableau.
Even if it is more recent it sounds like it needs to be done again
My CE has it’s own circuit, but it’s controlled not by a time switch in the tableau, but by a unit external to the tableau, an Elios4you power convertor that diverts excess solar to the CE. So, is this sort of arrangement strictly conformant ?
When we first bought the place we had a local electrician (tres bonne electricien apparently) to make it safe and au normes, who replaced the tableau and may have done a little rewiring (it’s hazy right now) while disconnecting stuff that wasn’t safe. The CE was on a separate circuit with a much newer switch/fuse box already, and I don’t think he touched it. Having it on a plug is good in some ways because I can unplug it before we leave and know that it’s unlikely to ever find itself accidentally left on, even if we have work done while away and the mains gets left on (which has happened).
Thanks Badger, point taken, but I won’t put myself to that expense. I did change out the fuses for cct breakers but no doubt that will have been illegal too. ( I know, I know, ‘do I value money over life’ etc. I’ll monitor the situation.)
Yes, you’re right of course, I couldn’t remember the name for what I think of as standard tariff.
I now know it’s ‘base’ as I have just filled in a meter reading online at the request of Seolis. Ouch!
Loads such as space & water heating draw relatively high currents for long periods. If there are potentially less than optimal connections (i.e. high resistance) within the circuit then the chance of them getting hot is greatly increased. Disallowing sockets reduces that risk by lowering the number of potentially dodgy connections. A cheap plug in timer only adds to the possible fire risk, despite what it’s rating might state.
