ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade Non-US Electrical Systems & Trades Some german electrical info

@PaulCornwall: This TV thing is a bad idea... they like to use the hairdryer act for murderings in movies. plugged hairdryer thrown into tub. ever heard of RCD hu?...

@PaulUK: no problem with that gender thing
i kew what flex means, i just didnt understand which area of application paulCornwall meant by saying "When ever i have been to Germany your cable system looks like flex, is this the case".

Here in Austria I've only seen 6mm2 solid. Was real tough wrapping that around the terminal screws of ca. 1913 Diazed fuses (I was installing a new feed to our apartment). In another place I used 10mm2 stranded for the same purpose. Pretty ridiculous for 20A main fuses. The wire I'm talking about had about 5 strands looking like 1.5mm solid wires each.
No, U-boats look like wirenuts with screws. You mean strip connectors or choc blocks (well, they don't look _that_ much like chocolate, but I can see the ressemblance).
On the cut strands: I just took apart a Schuko plug (the Kopp rubber type that'S used for garden stuff, etc). The strands were just stuffed loosely into the terminals, not even twisted. The wire ends were stripped far too long, abou 1/2 cm of copper was sticking into mid-air. I guess the screws only gripped maybe 5 strands of the 1mm2 cable. The blue wire was part black and when I took the plug apart the sheathing of the flex (it was only a short piece, had been cut off) came right off. Obviously never heard of a strain relief.
The only instance where I've seen flex inside walls was the infamous 0.75mm2 zip cord (Zwillingsleitung) used to feed an extra receptacle.

I think Paul (Cornwall) might be refering to your cables being round, making them look similar to 3-core flex from the outside.

Our cables in Britain are flat (or oval, really) with all the conductors laying side by side.

Here's the 4mm version of T&E (Twin & Earth), with stranded 4mm phase and neutral and a solid 2.5 bare earth wire:


Here's a 3-core-plus-earth, with solid 1.5mm wires (bare earth is 1.0):



[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 10-19-2003).]

British 4mm T&E with 2.5mm earth, I've never seen that!
All 4mm T&E I have seen in the UK has a 1.5mm earth.
The usual sizes of British twin & earth cable (6242Y) are as follows:
1.0mm with 1.0mm earth (CPC)
1.5mm with 1.0mm earth
2.5mm with 1.5mm earth
4.0mm with 1.5mm earth
6.0mm with 2.5mm earth
10.0mm with 4.0mm earth
16.0mm with 6.0mm earth

AFAIK 16mm is the largest size of flat twin & earth manufactured.

Note: 2.5mm T&E manufactured between 1970 & 1981 only carried a 1.0mm earth wire.
When the 15th Edition IEE Regs were issued in 1981, it was found that the 1.0mm earth was inadequate for certain combinations of fault current & overcurrent device. The cable standard (BS 6004) was revised & the earth wire incorperated in 2.5mm T&E increased to 1.5mm.

I tend to share Paul Cornwall's view of British T&E cable, it's crap, but considering how cheap it is, what can we expect?
One point in it's favour is that the flat construction enables better heat dissapation, & slightly higher current ratings than round cables of the same CSA.

And some more pictures.

German plugs:



left: Euro plug, fits -almost- everywhere in Europe. 2,5A. note the pins are not fully metal. they are partially touch protected. for example the italian outlets dont have the "hole" the schuko receptacles have, so it's prescribed the pin may only make contact after it cant be seen anymore from outside.

middle: Plug for Hairdryer, Vacuum cleaner, other power appliances that dont need grounding. 10A. Pins are thicker than euro, and cant be insertet into an euro outlet.

Right: Schuko, general Use, 16A. flat brass on top and bottom is the GND contact.
All plugs are not polarized.


Some big wires



top: 1,5mm² AWG 15 solid, for comparison

middle: 5x 16mm² with 7 wires per conductor. Thats the one used for House connection point -> Meter for example.

bottom: Single i guess 70mm² conductor, sector shaped. I removed this from a 4x 70mm² cable. usually not used single for fixed install, only in cables (double-insulated).

Cut view of the 5*16mm²


Some real bodybuilders work: Solid 6mm² supplying fuses in an old Fuse Panel. one wire supplies 5 fuses without an interrupt! they just removed the insulation, bent a "U" and continued to the next fuse.





[This message has been edited by :andy: (edited 10-20-2003).]

That's about what I had to do some time ago. Finally I gave a d*n on the regulations and went to 4mm2 as the stuff was only fused 20A anyway. Didn't get the idea of looping though, tried to get 2 wires under the screws (yes, the screws were even long enough to do that). Finally I left all that stuff alone and installed the original 2 circuit Diazed assembly with bus bars alongside of a 4 circuit + RCD breaker panel. The electrician gave me a slightly weird look when he saw Diazed, but signed it off without any further ado.
The 70mm2 stuff looks like the cable they wired our house service with (8 apartment building).
BTW, contour plugs aren't 10A, they're 10-16A (DC/AC), just like Schuko plugs. However, some carry lower ratings, depending on the appliance they're connected to. My Grundig reel-to-reel tape recorder has one rated as low as 2.5A.

Is the white (or gray) wire here being used as a neutral?

I see two wires under one screw in the bus and three (!!!) wires under the screw next to it.

thats what it is. seems to have been OK back the days (this panel is 30 years old).
thats actually our panel, where my PC is running on . never hat problems with the neutrals. is it permitted to do this now? i dont have to deal with building installations this often, the new panels all have 20+ ports for N and GND. and even these are touch-proptected!

i wanted to mount breakers in this panel for a longer time, but it still runs fault free, and our safety regulations get in my way here. I may do this work, but must have a "Master" to check it and measure all outlets before the Energy supplier reconnects it!

is the "master" title common in UK/USA?

in germany, you begin doing a "Training" for 3 and a half years at an industrial or electricians company, go to school and do several final examinations. thats what i did so far. then you can get your "master" title by half a year of school, go to a technicians school for 2 years and so on...

yep your right i assumed that because the cable was round it was a flexible type cable.

just looking a the pics of your plug tops,, no worries about polarity there, you guys across the channel dont have a worry with that..why is that??

because

-unplug before service
-using 1:1 insulation transformer for repairs on live appliances
-bigger appliances are 2-pole switched

or what problems do you think we should have?

[This message has been edited by :andy: (edited 10-20-2003).]