Stanley wrote:During our walk I noticed a large picture of a Morso stove same as mine in the card shop on Church Street. What struck me was that they had the firebox door shut and the ashpit open. Not a good thing as it can burn the grate out. Mind you, they may have had a very bad flue and needed all the draught they could get.
It's my stove in the window of Pumpkins Card Shop. The ashpit door was opened to give a bright yellow flame for the photograph. It's not normally open.
I thought that might be the reason Kev but of course didn't know it was yours.
I think I may have solved my trip problem and if I'm right it is entirely down to me. It dawned on me that my Sony HD recorder had a fan drawing air through the case and I shame to say I have never switched it off since I got it about 4 years ago! I now have it switched off when I'm not using it. (Doh!) I also put the nozzle of the vacuum cleaner over the ventilation holes and gave it a good suck out. I shall see what happens but up to now, no tripping out. I was pretty certain it was the recorder and it may have been simple overheating. We shall see..... If it is the cause, how daft have I been?
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
During our walk this morning.... The lady with the large dog (off lead and not muzzled) who instructed me to call Jack in as her dog "was not friendly". I didn't argue, just called Jack to me and left her to it but as I walked away I couldn't help but reflect that there are some very strange people about. What's the point in having a dog you can't trust? If it's that bad why have it off the lead and un-muzzled in a public place? Or is it the old story, a dog that has never been allowed to socialise and is nowhere as near as bad as she fears? It's a funny old world....
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
The rain hammering down outside..... It looks as though we will break the record!
The death of the young Indian medical student who was gang raped and beaten while travelling on a bus. A terrible, senseless crime which is provoking big protests about attitudes to women.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
Probably the same weather as here in Somerset. It's been raining for weeks now, very mild (about 11C each day and many nights too) but strong winds, heavy cloud cover, dark and wet, wet, wet. Floods all over the shop - the lakes on the moor had drained at one point a week or so ago but then it started all over again with the roads closed due to more floods. I might have already mentioned how a main trunk road has been closed by floods since my dad went into hospital 5 or 6 weeks ago when we were one of the last to get through and had to return from Exeter by a long detour. It's still closed and we've learnt that the flood was due to the Environment Agency deliberately breaching the bund that holds back the river and that this was done to save Taunton town centre from a flood (but they still got some flooding). Now, what a surprise - the road surface has cracked up and even when the floods depart the road will be shut until repaired which they say might not be until spring. Meanwhile, everyone who needs to go that way to work has a long journey plus fighting their way through the rush hour of an extra town on the route in order to get to their destination. Businesses such as pubs and shops along the trunk road are also without their usual trade and won't last out much longer.
Local people are beginning to realise that the big new housing estates built in the last decade on the outskirts of Taunton and Bridgwater (and those further ones now under construction) are on flood plains. The Env Agency warns against building them on flood plains but the local councils go ahead because they receive large sums of Section 106 funds from the builders in exchange for permission to build an estate. With the increasing rainfall and greater frequency of flooding these estates will be under threat, so the old sacrificial flooding of the countryside will be extended to protect the estates. Two new estates are in construction on our side of Taunton and you can see the sites are largely flooded already as the builders try to carry out their work. People will come in from other parts of the country to live in these estate houses, possibly unaware that they are buying a house on a flood plain, and will be surprised when they can't get a house insurance policy.
Nullius in verba: On the word of no one (Motto of the Royal Society)
Tiz, isn't it amazing that we've known for years that the more tarmac and concrete we put down the faster the run-off and the greater the likelihood of flash flooding. Add the changes we see in our climate and economics which make building on flood plains profitable and we get the perfect scenario for exacerbating the affects of any increase in rainfall. Once built, scenarios like sacrificial flooding of 'less important' agricultural areas becomes the only defence and the people who built sensibly on higher ground like you suffer for the towns. The worst part of it all is of course that once built, the new flood plain housing has to be protected in perpetuity. If there's an answer to all this it escapes me.....
As for what grabbed me? The errant intermittent fault that keeps activating the trip on my leccy system!
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
Stanley, have you considered the possibility that the trip itself is faulty? They can go out of tolerance and become more sensitive and lead to erratic tripping. Is it a single circuit that's tripping or the main RCCB on the consumer unit?
It's the main switch in the middle which controls all the power sockets. The other smaller trips control various lighting circuits. The 60 amp feed to the cooker and forward to the workshop is a separate circuit and has its own protection. I have considered it might be the main trip but have no way of knowing whether it's over sensitive or not. (See main postings on computer matters) Is there any way you can tell?
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
Your ring mains circuits for your sockets should have individual trips for each circuit as well Stanley. A modern consumer unit will have individual trips for each power and lighting circuit and larger current ones for such as cooker circuits and the like. There is also a main trip on the input to the consumer unit, this replaces the double pole mains switch that used to be present on older fuse boxes. If none of the individual trips are going only the main input one it does lean towards a faulty safety device rather than something on an individual circuit. Nothing you can really test yourself without the correct equipment.
PanBiker wrote:Your ring mains circuits for your sockets should have individual trips for each circuit as well Stanley. A modern consumer unit will have individual trips for each power and lighting circuit and larger current ones for such as cooker circuits and the like. There is also a main trip on the input to the consumer unit, this replaces the double pole mains switch that used to be present on older fuse boxes. If none of the individual trips are going only the main input one it does lean towards a faulty safety device rather than something on an individual circuit. Nothing you can really test yourself without the correct equipment.
Could be a split load consumer unit, Ian, with the sockets on one side and the lighting on the other, protected by 2 RCDs (I presume it's only the sockets going down). Could be something as simple as a loose wire, RCD's are sensitive things. Mine tripped out when the cable to the tumble drier got damp.
Agreed Kev, as noted in the other thread high resistance in any attached circuits could be the problem. Had mine tripping out with a loose neutral in the back of one socket. Mine also tripped every time an old incandescent light blew, better than looking for a bit of fuse wire though
Been over to Silsden this afternoon, just got back. What attracted me was the amount of standing water on the roads. A56, A59, Skipton Bypass. All the grates at the sides of the road backed up no doubt due to cuts in services. Some of the flooding completely across the carriageway to the centre line. I know we have had a lot of water and the ground is saturated but I think there may be a lot to answer for in getting rid of the length men.
Ian, re. consumer unit. When we rewired I told the Sparks not to economise on the unit and triggered by you I have just actually read the labels on the switches. I have a large red main switch, the trip unit that is giving the trouble and six RCDs. These are: cooker circuit, tv and workshop, two socket circuits and two lighting circuits. The trip that is giving the trouble seems to control just the workshop and two socket circuits.
It hasn't tripped since I last posted. I did the old stress test on it yesterday, tripped it with the test button and pushed it back in about six times in rapid succession. Am watching and waiting.....
One thing that occurs to me is that due to using the Morso stove and not being active in the workshop the temperature in there is much lower and the humidity level will be up. Nobody has answered my question directly but I believe the trip is not only an overload device but also an earth leakage detector. The wiring in the shed is all new and in good order but it may be that higher humidity in there is causing higher than usual earth leakage by ambient dampness. Am I talking sense?
(OG is wonderful, all these brains to tap into....)
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
Logical yes Stanley. The RCD's monitor imbalance between all connected lines a leakage to "earth" would do exactly the same. Your earth may well be effectively bonded to neutral anyway depending on the regs at the time your installation was done. A cycling session using the self test on the trip would do no harm and may have cleared contacts. As Kev said earlier the RCD's are very sensitive. The problem could certainly be down to the humidity level in the shed, Electric and water are no a good combination under any circumstances.
I'd be very surprised if earth-bonding was the problem, there are more clips on copper water pipes than you can poke a stick at! I haven't had any problem since the last one a few days ago. So far so good!
Apart from the fact I am getting webbed feet, what grabbed me last night was the idiots letting large fireworks off at midnight. They don't seem to realise that many people aren't obsessed with marking the start of the New Year. All right, I'm an old Scrooge but why not just sing Auld Lang Syne?
Stanley Challenger Graham
Stanley's View
scg1936 at talktalk.net
"Beware of certitude" (Jimmy Reid)
The floggings will continue until morale improves!
Old age isn't for cissies!
Stanley wrote:I'd be very surprised if earth-bonding was the problem
I don't think I ever suggested that in my post Stanley. Leakage to earth yes, although that would be a more permanent fault rather than the transient you have been experiencing. You may well have cleared it by cycling the self test although that would lean towards a fault in the trip itself. Time will no doubt tell.
I am with Stanley on the fireworks issue, we had a problem with the stray cat Izzy in November as the "5th" event lasted six nights, the poor animal didn't know which way to run. We made sure he was in last night, but at 6.30 pm he had just gone out into the garden when there was an almighty bang, I went out right away to find him and he ran straight into me in the dark, terrified!!
It would appear that the Secretary of State knows better than local residents and local government. The application for a mobile home park, on land between Barlick and Salterforth, has been granted on appeal.
