Fault

[trev]

Yer paggas cut no ice this side of the Pennines.
We'll just overwhelm them with the riches and luxeries we enjoy over here!

Madchester

Aye? Well just see how much luxury ye got left when the Geordie hordes comes to rape your beer and drink your women.
You sir, are almost a mackem!
There you go, I said it.
He made me do it Fatha!

 

[Silly Sausage]

These Mackems, they're not like Scousers are they?

Forgive me Fatha's Son!

 

[Knobhead]

Hello... Got a call from a. Customer saying when ever they plug in there 2kw heater it trips...

So One shal think the heater is faulty. I told them to unplug it and turn the rcd back on.

they rcd then restet... I thought over load may be a issue but she said she unplugged everything. She then plugged all the other items back in and it was fine.

But it she then got another heater and plunged that in put it in leval 2 and pop trips again.

Not been there yet.

Any by thing I should be looking out for when I arrive this week. Not seen this before ever. May be the fault current is to high? Maybe a slight short not big enough to trip the rcd but once the heater is on takes it over 30ma???

It maybe an alien inside the socket recharging their battery.

Rule one for fault finding:

Go and test the bloody job and don’t try to pre-empt the fault before hand!
The galling thing is you will charge the customer for the time you blunder about guessing what it may be.

Yet another Electrical Trainee wanting the job done for him.

 

[ian.settle1]

If you're a man of few words, what the hell are Geordie birds like?!

Bloody ugly by some photos in another posting when compared to Swedish birds

 

[Knobhead]

These Mackems, they're not like Scousers are they?

Forgive me Fatha's Son!

By god! The Mancunian isn’t going to side with the Mackems is he? It’s OK to keep the Scousers out but there are limits when it comes to alliances.

Archy, just don’t side with the White Rose louts.

 

[Knobhead]

Bloody ugly by some photos in another posting when compared to Swedish birds

Depends which way your looking at 'em.

 

[Pete999]

Sorry it's a rcbo not rcd..

What else has she got plugged into that circuit? sounds to me like it's overloaded

 

[telectrix]

By god! The Mancunian isn’t going to side with the Mackems is he? It’s OK to keep the Scousers out but there are limits when it comes to alliances.

Archy, just don’t side with the White Rose louts.

OI! thought you were a mate. lol.

 

[andyelectric]

Jed Clampett??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwzaxUF0k18

Hello... Got a call from a. Customer saying when ever they plug in there 2kw heater it trips...

So One shal think the heater is faulty. I told them to unplug it and turn the rcd back on.

they rcd then restet... I thought over load may be a issue but she said she unplugged everything. She then plugged all the other items back in and it was fine.

But it she then got another heater and plunged that in put it in leval 2 and pop trips again.

Not been there yet.

Any by thing I should be looking out for when I arrive this week. Not seen this before ever. May be the fault current is to high? Maybe a slight short not big enough to trip the rcd but once the heater is on takes it over 30ma???

Well there can't be many people nowadays that have a second 2kw heater available to use. It may well be that she has got them all over the house for all you know. When she says she's unplugged everything it may just have been in the room. It's pointless second guessing before you get there, so I would say this is a pointless question by yourself at the moment. Maybe if you have a look/test and are stumped.

 

[R G]

Just recently I have had a few faulty RCBOs (load related), mostly the BG brand , would it be possible to plug this appliance into another circuit , just to eliminate that,

 

[Thewiz]

Hello just had quick look at the fault on the way home last night as I was passing by. Basically the up sockets are on a rcbo it's a bit strange because when ever you plug some thing in like a battery charger for a drill or a power tool it does not trip. But when plugging in a heater it trip straight away. Didn't have my megger with me so didn't carry out any test as of yet, any one seen that before.

I swapped the rcbo over with a new one and still happened. I will run a ramp test to see it trips when I return along with the basic ir and r1+r2 tests.

I have seen it before when polarity has been reversed in a socket when energising a load the Rcd will trip.

 

[trev]

So you went to a job which you knew might need some testing without the one piece of equipment which would have allowed you to do it?
Interesting mate.
I appreciate that you were heading home and so time may have been short but surely loosening the socket face off for a quick look would have been the clever thing to do? However, the fact that only one item of kit is causing problems would point me in a certain direction.

 

[Thewiz]

Yes it was late. I explained I didn't have a tester with me she said ok can you just pop over and take a look.

Anyway.... What direction would that be?

 

[trev]

Well if only one thing is causing the RCD to trip then surely that's where to start looking?

 

[Thewiz]

No. I may not be explaining it correctly.

When a load such as a heater is plugged in the Rcd trip. A radio for example does not trip the Rcd.

If I took the heater to another socket it still triped.

 

[trev]

"The heater"?
Isn't that telling you something?
Is this heater the only thing that is tripping the RCD?

 

[Thewiz]

No because, another heater does the same thing and so does the underfloor heating

 

[trev]

But nothing else does it?

 

[Thewiz]

Nope just those as far as I could tell. One of the hostel only trips wen it's on level 2 heat.

 

[trev]

So several things are tripping the RCD and they all have one thing in common. They all have heating elements.
So if things without heating elements are not tripping it why are you wasting time thinking about polarity issues in the back of sockets?
Pat the heaters, test the UFH. That's where my money would be going if I was a gambling man.