**** heater installers....

[SPECIAL LOCATION]

During an EICR this morning at a 1 bed "all electric no-gas" apartment that has had old storage heaters replaced with some new wireless thermostat all singing & dancing heaters....

The **** who replaced them decided to half block the FCU's..
So impossible to open it up.. or replace the fuse!!!!

Do these people have any brain cells???

 

[binky]

Clearly not.

 

[ProDave]

I'll bet that is a brick wall and the new heater was too big and could not be bothered for the mess of moving it.

Oh how I hate brick walls and oh how I love that most houses here are timber stud and plasterboard and so much easier to make alterations like that.

 

[Murdoch]

That's just absolute CARP

Obviously you can only do an R2 on the circuit / heater and I would add a strongly worded comment on the EICR about the inaccessibility of the fuse / fused unit

 

[Apache]

I was thinking a **** heater was a very niche product I had not heard of. Given the intimate nature I assume would require 30ma RCD protection and a suitable IP rating......

 

[SPECIAL LOCATION]

I was thinking a **** heater was a very niche product I had not heard of. Given the intimate nature I assume would require 30ma RCD protection and a suitable IP rating......

Probably 10ma would offer greater level of protection in such locations?

 

[Apache]

Probably 10ma would offer greater level of protection in such locations?

yes a new regs section "extra special locations"

 

[Coll]

I'll bet that is a brick wall and the new heater was too big and could not be bothered for the mess of moving it.

Oh how I hate brick walls and oh how I love that most houses here are timber stud and plasterboard and so much easier to make alterations like that.

Amen to that, the apprentice years of chapping out bricks/concrete blocks to fit boxes and channels with feather cutters and 'dooking' irons! Finding ways to fit recessed metal boxes into holes cut surgically in lath and plaster, one mansion house rewired entirely in MICC behind such walls still haunts me. Filets et al screwed to lath, Jayzuz, it would/could be a judicial sentence for anti-social behaviour these days. Long before the days of blessed dry lining boxes, plastic conduit and the wonderful battery gadgetry of today, tis a breeze now, no wonder they don't want to go anywhere near brick walls. Aye, gimme timber studs all day long and underfloor access which is almost unheard of in new builds now. However, to the O.P's issue, it's beyond slack to leave a job like that no matter the bugeration of moving the outlet, the '****' like the Biblical poor will always be with us.

 

[Geoff1946]

"Finding ways to fit recessed metal boxes into holes cut surgically in lath and plaster, one mansion house rewired entirely in MICC behind such walls still haunts me. Filets et al screwed to lath, "

I love visiting historic houses, National Trust, etc, and I often admire the ingenuity and craftsmanship that has gone into equipping such places with modern installations. - Light switches concealed behind "invisible" opening sections of oak wall panelling, power points in huge old skirting boards which appear undisturbed for centuries, smoke detectors discreetly placed in decorative plasterwork and so on.

 

[Murdoch]

That S FCU is definitely inaccessible.

Its about time BS 7671 had a go at defining "inaccessible" once and for all

 

[Coll]

"Finding ways to fit recessed metal boxes into holes cut surgically in lath and plaster, one mansion house rewired entirely in MICC behind such walls still haunts me. Filets et al screwed to lath, "

I love visiting historic houses, National Trust, etc, and I often admire the ingenuity and craftsmanship that has gone into equipping such places with modern installations. - Light switches concealed behind "invisible" opening sections of oak wall panelling, power points in huge old skirting boards which appear undisturbed for centuries, smoke detectors discreetly placed in decorative plasterwork and so on.

Indeed, Geoff, most of my apprenticeship was in such building(s) and Lighthouse(s). Like you, marvelled at the work don't previously, conduits with bends of amazing symmetry, done not with mechanical pipe benders but clumsy wooden gadgets. Big cast-iron boxes, porcelain and brass-covered sockets and switches, ring mains unheard of to the old masters. Encountered every kind of wiring there was, fused neutrals! switchgear, lead cables VIR and all the rest of it anything could be used as conductors bar wet rope! No question, belong stuffed in a museum myself now. Boss was reputedly a crabbit old b*gger (63) pre-warned, expecting a difficult time, Apart from an electrical business he was a TV/Radio specialist, the first Marconi agent in that part of the Kingdom, fitted/fixed all manner of gadgetry including Decca et al to boats and whatever, if that wasn't-enough he was a Master Joiner! In the seven years with him, we never had a cross word between us. Got on like a house on fire. A fine man, a droll character who didn't suffer fools at all never mind gladly, miss him still. He had a poor memory of things that didn't interest him, recall us both getting a wee scolding from his dear wife Kate because we forgot to collect some groceries, as she headed for the kitchen her parting “If I'd asked Jacob (local gossiping pipsqueak who Alec had no time for.) to pick them up, he wouldn't-have forgotten”. Kate well out of earshot, Alec mutters to me regarding the said Jacob “You know it's perfectly easy to find something in an empty drawer” and winked. Was possibly at the tail-end of an era with demanding standard(s) that broached no compromise, and didn't expect to be complimented on what was considered to be just satisfactory no matter how difficult and challenging the task. Hard taskmasters are not always fun to be around but they can sure get your game up.