ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade Non-US Electrical Systems & Trades The Pyro thread

Totally agree with you Trumpy! At school we didn't even learn about the old color codes, yet you still find them everywhere! I don't know what some of my classmates are going to think should they once open a j-box with a mess of black, grey and red wires...

Ahh, you met them.

I've often criticized the DIY manuals here for the way that some of them make no mention of older methods of wiring.

Considering that many people tackling wiring will be doing so in old homes, what's the point of a DIY manual which is written as though the existing system has been wired since the 1980s?



[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 05-31-2005).]

QUOTE
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Ahh. you met them.
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No, they kept different hours to me.


Alan

Kiwi,
Being solid copper, they don't tend to like being moved about too much and I would avoid it as much as possible.
The other thing about the actual cable end/pot arrangement, is the fact that if not fitted properly in the first place, they can work loose over the years.
This can make opening a live board the same as opening a jack-in-the-box.
Safety glasses and Hot gloves are standard equipment when I work on any MIMS cabling.
No need to worry about explosiions in this case though, if it's going to occur, it will happen in the first 2-3 years of the cable being in service.
BTW, Pyro is a lot "safer" as far as cables entering a switch-board panel go, they have a proper gland on them to screw them to the panel hole.
Not like some idiots running PVC through a metal panel without even as much as a bush!.
Pyro is also quite rugged in it's construction Kiwi, I wouldn't be too concerned about moving it, unless you intend to have a full-on wrestle with it.
It's made to be moved about once it's installed.
Yes and by the way, the only cable you are allowed to run (vertically) through a lift shaft is Pyro.
NZECP 33 (now defunct I think) although brief, gives some guidance on Pyro installation and cable ratings.
Paul,
I agree totally and to a certain extent the people that write these books, although well-intentioned, have a lot to answer for, considering that the lack of information on older wiring systems, is often where the problems start for the average DIY'er, when they can't find the correct information, instead of getting a professional electrician in, these people are more likely to guess.
If we're really lucky, the powers that be will stop mucking around with the colour codes for a while and let one system get a foot-hold.
Ragnar,
Yeah you're right there, I assume this is a 3 phase circuit, not a single phase one?.


[This message has been edited by Trumpy (edited 06-01-2005).]

No confusion here in France! All the following colors must be considered hot ( live): black, red, brown, yellow, white, orange, gray, purple, pink, mauve, magenta, tan. And any other metal bits. Oh, and probably blue ( neutral), green or green/yellow (ground) and anything else vaguely conductive, like machine casings, conduit, faucets, door handles or damp wallpaper.

Alan

No. Black = hot, grey = neutral, red = ground. Old Austrian/German color coding. 3 phase would be even funnier. 4 wire 3ph systems would have been black-red-blue-grey, grey being either PEN or (usually) ground, others are phases. 5 wire is like single phase, S and T phase being blue and black (black-blue-black-grey-red).

Huh?

No problem on the basic single-phase circuit colors, but let me see if I've got this straight for 3-phase:

#1. 3-ph 4-w plus ground

Phases = Black, blue, black
Neutral = Gray
Ground = Red

If you're going to identify the phases, identify all of them I say, but at least this is consistent with 1-ph on the neutral & ground colors.


#2. 3-ph 3-wire plus ground:

Phases = Black, red, blue
Ground = Gray

So gray suddenly changes from neutral to ground (or combined N-G), but red is now a phase?

Yeah, exactly. That's about the main reason why that system was abolished.
Red could be about anything, ground, phase, switch leg (back then you often had two switches in one box, with three wires, black was the incoming phase, grey and red were the switch legs), 3-way traveler,... and besides, if they had conduit people used whatever they could get. i've seen a red switch leg and a red ground in one conduit, black wires (all but the neutral, including the ground were black), red, and two greys at a light fixture (red neutral and two grey phases, no ground),...
According to code (dating from 1956) grey could be either a neutral, a PEN or a ground wire, the latter only in a three-phase system. That was the most common setup, at least in Germany, the old 3ph sockets in most cases only had 3ph+ground. Austrians always preferred conduit over cable and used mainly un-coded phases and a red ground.

Ragnar,
Just by reading what you've posted, I would tend to agree with abolishing a system like that.
Sounds like a wiring nightmare to me.