That reminds me of the temporary lights (for road works) I came upon in Ireland once. I was quite surprised when the red-&-amber phase came on instead of them just going straight from red to green like normal Irish lights, so I assume they were using British equipment.
(It was somewhere up around Leitrim or Cavan, so maybe the local repair crew decided to make a quick dash over the border to "borrow" some lights!
)
Why do some old meters in the UK say 230V?
They possibly date back to before the early 1970s and the standardization at a nominal 240V.
Prior to that, the actual declared nominal voltage could vary from one district to another: 220, 230, 240 and 250V were the most common, with correponding 3ph levels of 380, 400, 415, and 440V (the last is actually 433V, but was usually quoted as 440).
Some old districts in the larger towns still had 3-wire DC into the 1960s, so the voltage between "outers" would have been 440 to 500V.
[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 07-08-2003).]