ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade Non-US Electrical Systems & Trades Big DIY goof re-visited

ECN regulars will no doubt remember these pictures from a while back, but I thought I'd repost them for our newer members.

This is one installation I don't think I'll ever forget! I still find it incredible that anyone actually did this!

Hmm.... Don't seem to be many red wires in here:


Oh, here they are, all down at the bottom. Wanna call the fire brigade right now and save time?




And I bet they spent a fair bit of time getting all those wires threaded through the holes:

LOL thats a nice job (The person installing must have thought they`d be scoring free juice)

heres a few pics i took of a periodic inspection i did a few months ago (again done by a DIY er)









Those 2 silver cables (Clear insulated wire, same a xmas tree wire) were supplying a light fitting above the sink in the bathroom





Pudding Joint in all its glory : )



Thinking back im sure i counted about 15 JB/s in the loft.

Needless to say this house scored a few 1`s in the Observations & Recommendations box, and the home owner asked for the house to be re-wired.

EDIT: Most smileys removed due to picture count.

Paul, we got a BIT suspicious about the DIY work in the house we moved into when we discovered that we couldn't find a breaker for the hall lights.

We tried all the breakers one by one.

Then, we tripped all of the breakers and it went off..

Turned out it was being fed from 2 circuits simultaniously!!!!! Basically, a a live from a socket circuit was connected into a lighting circuit live at a junction box where someone'd gotten a BIT confused!!!!

One of which was a 16A socket radial.

Anyway, needless to say, the house got a complete rewire! As that wasn't the only scary DIY job we found!

There were several incidents of the polarity on DIY stuff being wrong where the red wire was neutral and the black wire was live!

4 Spot lights wired in SERIES! (they could never figure out why they didn't work!

Mmmm shall I go on?

Absolutley everything was ripped out when we moved in.. completely new electrical system...

Btw, this guy didn't confine his wonderful tallents to the electrical system either. The plumbing was rather "creative" too. It all had to be redone!

lol

Hi everyone, I have been lurking for a few days and thought I'd finally jump in with both feet (hopefully not in mouth).

I remember when I was working as a flooring contractor in Southampton, UK, finding a zip wire (the stuff maplin used to sell, about 0.5 mm sq I think, rated for 80v 1 amp IIRC?) laying under the carpet padding... I was moving it so as not to cut someones speaker line when I got a tingle... so I followed it more closely. You guessed it, hooked into a 30 amp JB on the ring!... the other end was even more interesting, being taped to the pins of a washing machine plug

Needless to say, 5 mins with a small screwdriver and advice to call an electrician LOL.

Congratulations on a forum that seems to be full of knowledgeable and great people... I have enjoyed looking back through 3 years of posts

Hi Chipmunk, and welcome to ECN. Glad you've found plenty of topics of interest here.

I've seen zipcord used for a variety of things before, but not for a washing machine! From memory, I think Maplin used to stock a few different zipcord types, rated between about 60 and 100V.

Bridged circuits is something I've come across quite often. You go along the board, pulling fuses or flipping breakers one at a time and the outlet you're testing remains stubbornly hot. Then you just know you're in for a fun time trying to sort it out.....

San,
Those pics look all too familiar. From the box styles and cables that looks like the original wiring dates from the 1950s/early-1960s, with the usual more recent hacks and modifications.

Things that make you go "hmmm"

Thanks for the welcome Paul, I wonder, how often do you come across the one that won't die even when you pull the main switch?

I've had that happen a couple of times, both times it wasn't attempted fraud, (EG a meter bypass), just incredible DIY incompetance, wiring to the line side of the main switch for example... how do people do that by ACCIDENT???