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Old 17th Jan 2012, 12:16 am   #61
McMurdo
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Well despite the parents house being built I think 1954 or so, it had a mixture of round bakelite surface dolly switches on wood pattresses, new square crabtree flush dolly switches and all Bill 13A sockets on radials wired individually back to the MEM Kantark and mounted in a mix of in-the-wall and in-the-skirting. All the twin cables are very sound even now. I have since added earths to the lighting upstairs where she has had for example brass light switches and I could slide the earths down the conduit that is buried in the plaster.

By contrast my aunties (younger) bungalow had most of the rubber wiring perished and I had her rewire it when I was called to a tripping breaker caused by shorts behind switches due to bare wires and powdered rubber. She had had a modern consumer unit & RCD installed when she wanted an electric shower but they'd joined the consumer unit to the existing rubber with stubs of PVC T&E connected in the loft with connectors.
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Old 17th Jan 2012, 9:43 am   #62
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Seems like a good excuse to put up this pic of my parents' house wiring before I rewired in '85. House is a 1930s semi. It had a power box and two lighting boxes, fused both poles. There was a wooden sub-board for lighting in the kitchen with porcelain inserts, again, fused both poles.

Light wiring was in pin-grip conduit with rubber insulation (perished at the ends!) Uncle Harry (Harry Barnes, Electrical Contractor) put 13A sockets in in the early 1960s.

There was never any problems with it, safety or otherwise. We're all still here!
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Old 17th Jan 2012, 8:55 pm   #63
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

It's nice to see some real switchgear for a change, I can't see the modern plastic stuff living that long.

Did the neutral fuses ever get linked out? I would have thought by the 60s neutral fusing would no longer be required. As far as I am aware it was never needed in Devon where I live. I've only ever seen one installation that had fuses in the neutral, and the fuse board looked home made!
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Old 17th Jan 2012, 9:13 pm   #64
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by matthewhouse View Post
It's nice to see some real switchgear for a change, I can't see the modern plastic stuff living that long.

Did the neutral fuses ever get linked out?
Ours didn't!

Looking at the boxes, I suspect that the unused 10A box on the RHS was originally for 5A round-pin sockets (and would've been stripped out by Uncle Harry). There is an empty conduit visible going downwards under the floor, and I'm guessing it once contained a 5A socket circuit. Lighting was split (upstairs and downstairs) at the wooden encased fusebox in the kitchen.

The original light switches were of the sunken type, with a square brass plate held flush to the wall by a central threaded ring around the dolly.

I'd like to find the make of the switchgear. The black power cct box bears the number 'X6085' and has, for a symbol, a 'U' magnet with wound poles. The 10A boxes have a 'T' in a circle. Tenby?

Interestingly, when wallpapering one time, we discovered a gas pipe and wall bracket for a gas lamp in the bathroom. No such fittings in any other room, so perhaps it was established even then that electricity in bathrooms was something to be wary of?
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Old 17th Jan 2012, 9:28 pm   #65
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

When I worked in Cheapside EC2 in 1954 the shop had a split phase system, 110-0-110 volts. They were in the process of changing over to single phase but the electricians got a bit ahead of themselves and installed what was then a new invention - the consumer unit, thus solid neutral - before they had changed the supply. Guess who managed to short 'neutral' to earth on a metal clad socket. There was a loud bang and a flash and all the lights went out, as they did in the insurance company next door - I left soon afterwards.

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Old 17th Jan 2012, 10:16 pm   #66
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Just a general question, but why have a fused neutral?

Surely with an AC supply there would be no voltage between it and earth anyway, so no chance of the fuse blowing in the event of a short?

I suppose it would blow on overcurrent, but why not rely on the fuse in the phase line to clear that type of fault (the advantage being the circuit is then dead)?

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Old 17th Jan 2012, 10:25 pm   #67
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

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Originally Posted by ColinB View Post
...why have a fused neutral?

Surely with an AC supply there would be no voltage between it and earth anyway...
And even with a DC supply too!
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 1:55 am   #68
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Question Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

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Originally Posted by ColinB View Post
Just a general question, but why have a fused neutral?
Colin
I can only assume that that was with the 110v. - 0v. - 110v. system, which presumably was a.c. bi-phase with the fuse in the 0v. line. Of course, that's fine for a 110v. - 0v. dead short, but not good at all for a 110v. - 110v. short! And then again, if 110v. - 0v. - 110v. was distributed around to outlets, all switches on those outlets would have to be DPST types.

Then again, was the incoming feed to the premises bi-phase anyway - or was there an isolating transformer with single-phase on its primary in there somewhere?

For its time, all sounds a bit strange to me. Perhaps I've misunderstood what I've read.

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Old 18th Jan 2012, 9:23 am   #69
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

My house had fuses in the incoming Live and Neutral. These were connected between the company fuse and a multitude of fuse boxes. I assumed this was a hangover from the days when the supply was DC and provided by the tramway company. Up until the time the supply was converted to underground the overhead wires were carried on steel tramway type poles, even though trams and trolley buses never ran along my road.
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 10:55 am   #70
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by kalee20 View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by ColinB View Post
...why have a fused neutral?

Surely with an AC supply there would be no voltage between it and earth anyway...
And even with a DC supply too!
A true neutral (defined as a current carrying conductor that is at close to earth voltage) does not need fusing in any common circumstances, though the practice was widespread.

It was common in DC days to fuse both supply wires, both at the suppliers cut out and for sub-circuits.
If BOTH supply wires were live, then fusing both would be essiential.
If one wire was an earthed neutral, and the other was live, then only the live wire needs a fuse, though it was common practice to fit fuses in both.
This may have been to allow for future changes that made either wire live.

Another reason was that many buildings had supplies from more than one company, at different voltages, or one DC supply and one AC supply.
Fusing BOTH wires of BOTH supplies was then advisable to at least partialy protect against any accidental interconnection of the two supplies.
Consider a 3 phase AC supply fused at 100 amps for a large electric motor and presume that the plant room is fitted with electric lights supplied at 110 volts DC, via a 5 amp fuse in the live wire only. Now suppose that the unfused neutral wire of the lighting circuit is accidently connected to one phase of the AC motor supply. A large current will flow from the live AC wire, via the unfused neutral of the DC lighting circuit, to earth. It is probable that the neutral wire of the lighting circuit would catch fire before the 100 amp fuse opens.
Had the neutral wire been fitted with a 5 amp fuse, this would operate before anything could catch fire.

Yet another reason for fusing the neutral was that in the past both wires had been live.
Many early DC schemes used a 3 wire supply with an earthed neutral (often called the center wire) together with a positive and a negative.
In the early days, the positive and negative outers were often at 120 volts, giving 240 volts between the outers.
A customer requiring 240 volt service would therefore be connected between outers, and both wires must be fused since each is live at 120 volts.
Later, most supply companies doubled the voltage to 240 volts from each outer to the earthed neutral, with 480 volts between outers.
Existing customers would then be reconnected between one outer and the earthed neutral, thereby still receiving 240 volts, and almost certainly retaining the fuses in both wires.
Latter still, the supply would have been changed to AC with the existing 3 wire street mains being used for 2 phases from a 3 phase supply, and an earthed neutral. Many service cutouts and consumers installations still being equiped with double pole fuses.
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 11:26 am   #71
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by McMurdo View Post
Well despite the parents house being built I think 1954 or so, it had a mixture of round bakelite surface dolly switches on wood pattresses, new square crabtree flush dolly switches and all Bill 13A sockets on radials wired individually back to the MEM Kantark and mounted in a mix of in-the-wall and in-the-skirting.
We had an odd mixture in our first house, an early 50's build. When we moved in there were some original outlets - black horizontal singles with earthed metal flushboxes fed by rubber cable in steel conduit (the conduit provided the earth) - but the outlet in the laundry was separate switch and socket on a wooden block, fed by early TPS. An older socket, but theoretically newer cable.

The original lighting circuits were unfused rubber cable, two cores (no earth). Black vertical plastic switches (same vintage as the outlets) in most rooms, but an old switch in the bathroom (not sure of an accurate name, but one of those with a kind-of spring-loaded mechanism).

The only explanation I could think of is that it was built with various old junk as a cost-cutting post-war measure (we didn't have anywhere near the shortages you guys had but it would have still been tight). Steel conduit would have been phased out 20 years before the house was built!

Of course by the time we moved in there were a number of newer outlets installed on TPS, but most had been connected to a single 20A MCB which tripped regularly - we had a few more circuits installed and did a little rewiring while we were there.
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 12:52 pm   #72
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Hi,
I have seen some "1950's" (possibly earlier) wiring perils in a couple of the houses that I have lived in over the years - my parents house originally had 5 amp two pin sockets when we moved there in 1965 but these were rapidly changed to 13 amp BS1363 types as my mother didn't want me to poke anything in the un-shuttered two-pin ones
The original lighting circuit remained untouched though, which meant that we had a newer four way MK fuse box for the 13 amp ring main, cooker, immersion heater and some additional lighting that was added to the property.

The original lighting circuit still had two circular porcelain (I think) fuses with brass dolly switches linked with a bar, so I suspect that this had a fused neutral, the house was in a small mining village in North east Yorkshire so I suspect would have originally had a DC supply from the Ironstone mine.

In around 1971 we were totally rewired which also included the fitting of an ELCB (not RCD)

The other house that I encountered some extremely dodgy wiring in was one of the rented properties that I live in as an adult, which would have been in the late 1990's, This appeared to have radially connected sockets which, I guess, would have originally been 5 or 15 amp 3pin, being converted to 13 amp ones by simply being replaced at some time.

The lighting fuse box was a glass doored live and neutral fused one, situated in an upstairs bedroom and not co-located with the other fuse boxes which were a mixture of various single 15 amp ones made my MEM and suchlike.
Once again this property was a small mining village presumably originally supplied with electricity generated from the pit.

Andrew
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 10:47 pm   #73
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by russell_w_b View Post

I'd like to find the make of the switchgear. The black power cct box bears the number 'X6085' and has, for a symbol, a 'U' magnet with wound poles. The 10A boxes have a 'T' in a circle. Tenby?
Looks like "Bill" switchgear, though I don't recognise the motif you describe.
Any chance of some closer detail pics?
Rob.
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 10:54 pm   #74
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
The black power cct box bears the number 'X6085' and has, for a symbol, a 'U' magnet with wound poles
GEC

Quote:
The 10A boxes have a 'T' in a circle
Tucker Telac

Lucien
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 11:05 pm   #75
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Thanks, Lucien.
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Old 18th Jan 2012, 11:20 pm   #76
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lucien Nunes View Post
Quote:
The black power cct box bears the number 'X6085' and has, for a symbol, a 'U' magnet with wound poles
GEC

Quote:
The 10A boxes have a 'T' in a circle
Tucker Telac

Lucien
Thanks, Lucien.

Attached are some close-ups (phwoarrr!). I was going to have a ratch through my 'Sunco' catalogue, but you beat me to it.
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Old 19th Jan 2012, 1:27 am   #77
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

The "MAGNET" name and electromagnet symbol described were some of GEC's trade marks that were used on much of their stuff before the war. By the time GEC relaunched itself as Marconi and then effectively sunk, the last vestige of this was that the section that organised travel for its employees was called "Magnet Travel".
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Old 20th Jan 2012, 8:16 am   #78
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Parts of Europe used 3 phase, 4 wire AC at 127/220 volts, which required that both poles of 220 volt circuits be fused.
A few such supplies probably remain in use, but most were changed to 220/380 volt 3 phase, 4 wire.
Note that consumers could still use the same 220 volt lamps and appliances before and after the change, all that changed was that the installation was connected phase to neutral instead of phase to phase.

127 volt appliances would have been obsolete, but very few existed.

Single phase, center tapped, dual voltage AC supplies at 110/220 were sometimes used in parts of Europe, but never widespread. They were usually replacements for 3 wire DC schemes at similar voltages.

Single phase center tapped supplies at 120/240 volts AC were, and still are the norm in the USA.
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Old 20th Jan 2012, 9:01 am   #79
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

Hi,

As a family we moved into an old farmhouse in 1975.

The electrics were an A-Z of practice from the 30s through to the mid 70s. The original install was lead sheathed rubber – Some of this had a separate earth conductor running inside the sheath, which was just as well, because at some points under the floor boards upstairs movement of the joists had worn both off both the lead sheathing and also the rubber insulation. This lead to small sections of bare conductors….. Running amongst tinder dry insulating “chaff” !

A later addition was a voltage type earth trip, that tripped on average a couple of times each week in an apparently random way. The problem though was that this didn’t appear to have the correct rating for the job. There was evidence of heating and the whole fuse box smelled of stale smoke.

A condition of the mortgage was that the wiring has to be replaced immediately. When the trip was removed, it was found that the rear of it had completely melted at some point.

The fuse box was a complete mess of different switch gear and fuse boxes, added as various parts of the house had changed usage. Aside from being a farm, the property had had also been a dairy, a bakery, shop and a transport café / hostelry. Because of the latter, the downstairs lights were all controlled from a massive matrix of round Tucker Telec Bakelite switched mounted on a board in the kitchen.

Some kind soul had rigged a pendant switch to a light in the hallway just inside the door, so at least you had a light start to your dark stumble to the kitchen to switch the other lights on ! This pendant switch was “interesting” in its self because its white body temporarily glowed violet when the light was switched on!

The original junction boxes were of a square metal type, connection was by twisting the wires together onto a ceramic “cap”. The earth sheaves were clamped to the metal case. The problem was that the lids of many had not been replaced, and again insulating chaff had migrated into the boxes and around the elderly wiring. In all honestly, the original work appeared to have been done to a very high standard, it was subsequent work that was extremely variable. The condition of the actual rubber was good, with very little signs of degradation, the only exception being the ceiling pendants that were brittle.

The power circuits were of course radial. The living room only had 1 round pin outlet, but the guy we bought the house from proudly showed us how he could connect very many appliances to the socket by use of a large bag of adapters he kept by the side of the socket. The resulting “tree” he could construct was a wonder to behold!

My regret is in not retaining the many original fixtures and fittings when the rewire was completed. Pocket money though was temporarily augmented by selling the lead from the cabling to the local scrappy. It was stripped and with the help of a sympathetic metalwork teacher converted to small ingots – I can’t see a modern school allowing that kind of thing to occur today !
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Old 20th Jan 2012, 10:02 am   #80
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Default Re: Perils of the 1950s household.....

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The original junction boxes were of a square metal type, connection was by twisting the wires together onto a ceramic “cap”.
'Scruit' connectors ('screw it'). That's what I meant to mention in my brief description of my parents' house wiring. This was the normal way of connecting lighting wires in the 1930s. VIR cable made off and twisted under a porcelain thimble with a coarse thread inside.
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