RCD protected circuits (sockets problem)

[binky]

     My biggest problem is the fact that my kitchen is all newly tiled, the rest of the ground floor has hardwood down.... and there’s not a massive amount of floor space. The electrician, rather than seeing this as a challenge, doesnt really want to get involved.

 I had the same problem for many years ie until I totally gutted my kitchen and could get to cabling. I had a damaged cable in the wall, to rectify I split the ring so the damaged section was isolated at 2 sockets, then changed the MCB to a 20A, which works fine, just had to remeber not to run the tumble drier, dishwasher and turn the kettle on at the same time. So if you can get the fault traced there should be no reason to damage tiling or flooring.

 

[binky]

Hi, for the kitchen sockets, I can make a list of appliances, however he’s supposed to have done a test where he sat at his testing meter and I switched on appliances one by one, he checked the reading and found no problem (supposedly)

 Turning appliances on and off is unlikely to prove much at all, bit pointless in my opinion.

q1 what appliances are on this cct, and is a timed appliance like a water heater on the same cct?

q2 does cct trip at a random times including during the night? - good indicator of fridge/ freezer

q3 the other favourite is heating elements in cookers / grills. faults with these may only occur when at a certain temperature and they have heated up.

generally though, if the MCB is tripping it tends to be a cct fault, if RCD trips, an appliance fault....these are very general  :^O

 

[Sharpend]

 I had the same problem for many years ie until I totally gutted my kitchen and could get to cabling. I had a damaged cable in the wall, to rectify I split the ring so the damaged section was isolated at 2 sockets, then changed the MCB to a 20A, which works fine, just had to remeber not to run the tumble drier, dishwasher and turn the kettle on at the same time. So if you can get the fault traced there should be no reason to damage tiling or flooring.

Really? So you gutted the kitchen, ripped the walls apart to locate cabling, found the damaged cable and didn't cut it out and replace? Odd or is there more........?

 

[binky]

no I lived with the fault left by previous owner for about 8 years before we gutted and rewired the kitchen. 

 

[Sharpend]

Ah a reversed engineered answer, got it  

 

[Tony S]

no I lived with the fault left by previous owner for about 8 years before we gutted and rewired the kitchen. 

My ex-wife would have redesigned the kitchen twice by then.

 

[ProDave]

re the garage, we turned off the isolator switch, and the problem persisted, instantly tripping off, electrician said that this proves it was a problem with the supply under the house, probably a wet junction box. That issue solved itself and hasn’t gone off since

So you identified a problem with the circuit feeding the garage, and that fault "solved itself"

But something is still tripping.

I would want to completely disconnect that suspect garage circuit from the main CU and see if that solves your issues.

Keeping a circuit connected that at one point tested as faulty, it is no surprise you still have issues.

 

[Sharpend]

My ex-wife would have redesigned the kitchen twice by then.

Doesnt mean she'd have had two kitchens by then though. 

 

[binky]

can't afford that many kitchens..... :^O

 

[Tony S]

I wasn’t very good when it came to finishing the tiling.

 

[Paul2129]

The kitchen sockets and house related problems had presented themselves several times before the garage did, and the garage ‘seemed’ like it was caused by the flooding. It was really heavy, and I know one of my customers had lost power in half of their house, they’re just down the road. The electrician was correct when he said, “give it a few days to dry out”, it did then just switch back on.

     I’m more bothered about problems in the house. It’s really very difficult to get good tradesmen around where I live. Some tests should really be done.

     In the meanwhile, it’s working. It just bugs me

 

[ProDave]

The point is you identified a problem on the garage circuit and that problem then went away. With the garage circuit still connected that fault could come back. 

With an RCD tripping the fault is not always on the circuit you think.

So knowing the garage circuit is suspect,  I would completely disconnect it (I mean disconnect all 3 wires not just turn it off) and run like that for a while and see if anything in the house trips again.

 

[Paul2129]

I’ve found an ideal way to sold this problem, we can park this one for good. I’ve sold the house !

for my next place, is there a simple set of tests that an electrician can run to determine the state of health of an electrical system ?

 

[ProDave]

Yes. It's called an Electrical Installation Condition Report.

Your problems might not be over, your buyer might ask for one for the house you are now selling.

 

[Paul2129]

You’re probably right, and maybe there will be no fault on the day it’s tested  we’ll see how we go