Fuseboard Fire, House Fire, Exotic life of an Electrician
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- čas přidán 5. 09. 2024
- when fuse boards catch fire, this could of easily been a lot worse, and become a full on house fire.
we stripped back all damaged cable and jointed new cable to a new metal 18th edition fuse board.
massive thanks to consumer unit world. / consumerunitworld
Rhino trade insurance use code BUNDY10 on the phone or online, www.rhinotradei.... 0116243790
massive thanks to consumer unit world. / consumerunitworld
This video is for entertainment purposes only and is in no way intended as a guide or 'how to'.
If you would like to support me further I now have a Patreon page. If you would like to become patron please follow the link below. This will enable to me to create much more content for you, thank you!
/ nickbundyelectrical
Hands up who watched this unit get Clived?
Yep, watched Clive's video then came here!
Me!
Yooo! It came up randomly in suggestions and I thought hey that looks exactly like the unit I watched him go over earlier.
same straight from clives
Me!
I'm an old industrial electro mechanical engineer and agree that this guy is extremely professional. Great guy for such a young age. Keep up the good work.
Yes I agree very professional keep the good work up guys.
I’m not even an electrician and yet I can’t stop watching these videos 😂
You might be an Ohmosexual?
Couldn't resist could you??
@@edglue6138 culdnt stop laughing
I love that joke
@@topchannel1000 haha
You're not alone!
Big Clive sent me here
15:30 Thank you for saying my mistake and not my bad
Ugh I don't think that one ever caught on over there. Most fortunately!
@Ian Clegg Not sure about shot, that's a bit far but definitely would be finna' get smacked ;)
Big Clive's patreon squad reporting in
Big Clive's cheap-ass viewer squad ready for action.
Aye!
@@kellyrjohnson7693 Big Clive's ass squad ready for action......
Bigclive brought me here too :)
The first decent and honest electrician I have seen on here that doesn't spout crap. Great job well done you!!!!
Look at Artisan Electrics too
Absolutely fantastic hand work. Master material. Adam is a lucky bloke to have you showing him the ropes. An outstanding repair, going over an above for the customer (who I am sure was breathing down your neck all day). The work with the Megger was top notch and very well worth finding. Bet the customer had no idea it was like that for years. Best Regards, Gerald Magill B.Eng in Electrical Engineering (Hons). My respect.
Bit of Kopex and insulation tape would have been reet.
Haha
Looked in comments for this. Did not disappoint 🤣
Congratulations to Adam, he has learnt his trade knowing his tests
Great team. Absolutely perfect apprenticeship and Boss for Adam.
Big up Nick and keep up the good work lads! 👏🏽👌🏽👍🏽
All those peculiar UK tests for ring mains.
Well done both of you . I think it’s every electricians nightmare that something could happen on their jobs. We all try to be diligent but having seen a missed lose neutral at a D.B that had started to over heat . I can testify to being capable of making mistakes. The trade is not only demanding, but also comes with a lot of responsibility. Seeing what can result when things do go wrong is a very sobering thought . Regards from Mike
Its always the last one you try , when you find it , you don't try any more ..lol
I came here after watching the Big Clive post-mortem. As I said on his video, it was the CZcams equivalent of eating dessert before the main course.
This video is a great example of why the UK requires some fire-blocking where the cables pass through the wall. Had that not been there...
Tbh a torque screwdriver would not necessarily solve the issue of a board fire. It might have helped but often the torque settings from the manufacturers arent good enough and you can still move the cables in the terminal. In essence not using a torque screwdriver isn't the main problem, its that a cable was loose in the terminal and probably arcing.
if something was brushing against them every day then every day was increasing the chance of an arc, thats the only way I can see it happening even when torqued correctly. tails don't move unless they're moved.
my guess is the family car door mirror was clipping it every day.
Hi Nick, from an old spark from the 60's. I enjoyed watching you undertaking this job. This is just an observation not a criticism, wouldn't it been easier to replace the tails and to cut back burnt cables to a sound piece then used a signal injector to fined the location of all the cables rather than spend time trying to untangle that mess?
Peter.
I’m not sure about easier or quicker but it would have been enough cleaner that it would certainly have been my inclination.
I suppose being able to replicate the exact breaker values and numbering of the old circuits has some value, but honestly… this seems like a “start from fuckin’ scratch” situation if ever there was one.
The 2 of you have done a cracking job repairing that mess... 👍
Big Clive sent me!
At least you are not in someones house in a cramped hall cupboard with the owners constantly bothering you with questions and watching - nothing worse than having a customer leaning over your shoulder putting you off!!!
🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕🍕
This is the first one of your videos I've watched and I am absolutely fascinated. My parents (U.S.) had a basement fire half a decade ago from just... 80 years? of patches on patches. The washer and dryer ran on a literal fuse box up until around 2000, which was then patched into the breaker box...
While they were on vacation, a fire started in the wall behind the box, where the old wiring for the fuse box was. Near as anyone could tell, decades of the washer and dryer running had shaken connections loose enough that when the heat kicked on, something went. We're thankful we had a neighbor watching the house who saw the smoke well before the fire got hold of the main structure. Cracked the foundation on our porch addition; the fire on the porch was stopped getting into the foyer by old asbestos siding if you can believe. Smoke damage through the whole home; we're still working on last wallpaper replacements etc. 7 years later.
We now have a massive beautiful breaker box that's well rated for all our modern appliances and wiring, plus upgrades to the upstairs, and then some. And, not labeled with masking tape...
So this video was fantastic to see, personally, to have an idea of just some of what must have been done to coordinate the spiderweb of original 2-prong cabling going through the whole house (the base wires were upgraded on repair to prepare for running grounded wiring to the upstairs), grounded cabling to the kitchen, another set of grounded cabling to the basement den, the newest grounded wiring to the basement bathroom with GFI outlets...
Thanks so much for sharing.
I bet the smell in there was wonderful I've had to straighten out a blowed up board before in your hands stink for days even wearing gloves Keep On Keepin On
No way Adam "bro'd" you! The cheek of these youth today! 🤣
Also - wonder leads? Wander, wonder, same thing!
Great job though gents! Excellent work! 👍
Good stuff Nick, Feel for the client, glad you put this out there hopefully the general public view this and realise all these improvementsl/ costs and EICR (reports) not certificates do have a valid reason, and not just making jobs for the boys, Well done 👏 👍
Be interested to know insurance company's thoughts.
Big Clive sent me here. Top shelf work, mates. Total pro!
Very relaxing to watch
Great work I'm doing a domestic Installers course at the moment and all your videos are always informative. Hope Adam realises how lucky he is to have someone willing to teach him and tech him the right way. Keep up the great work.
Surely that's the WHOLE point of an apprenticeship?
domestic installers courses are dangerous in my opinion, all tradesman should be time served its the only way you get the experience needed to be competent at the job, seen many jobs messed up with "electricians" who have done 6 week courses.
I served a 4 year indentured Apprenticeship plus an extra 2 years day release to get my HNC. Not a fast of these short courses I'm afraid.
Great video nick, as a firefighter currently retaining as a spark found this this interesting as go to 2 or 3 of these a year. Good to see gloves as that fire damage is full of carcinogens that will be absorbed by the body that can lead to cancer.
Very lucky they still have a house. Good work lads. Wouldn’t it have been easier to replace all the fire damaged cable, identify the rings with end to end test then install the C/U, liven up and identify the other circuits once live?
The fire service and DNO were involved, meaning until all the dead tests are done and you're ready to live test they will not put the fuse in. It's just the legislative steps you have to carry out after an incident like this.
I didn’t want to risk anything being live until I knew exactly what did what bud
I was an electrician, now retired, In australia we used to use mains in 100A fuse, main breaker manual only, ELCB. for wet areas, 8A breakers for lights. 16 amp breakers for power points, 32 amp fuse for oven / cooktopm, 32A for hot water, plus others for Air Conditioner hot water boost element etc. had a problem with one circuit, the hot water service. the fuse holder had a badly treaded screw even though it was tight it wasnt gripping the wire 100 percent. the screw was missing about two turns worth of thread. the inital punn and jiggle the wires then retighten the screw didn't reveal a problem. It took about a month before it failed. Had to remove the fuse holder and clean up the wire hole in the fibreglass panel then refit a new fuse carrier and no more problems.
Great video and give Adam a payrise. 12 hour shift without complaining. What month was this done. you both looked cold. Do you have any more like this. BTW big clive Sent me.
Excellent repair. I have been a qualified electrician since 1982. Luckily I have not had to deal with any domestic house bashing electrics apart from friends and family 🤨. Fortunately I work on industrial repair and maintenance. I came across several burnt out installations just much bigger !! 🔌😎
Fantastic job guys; and great video too. Quite apart from the actual cause of the fire to start with, a great case study for why DNO's should be obliged by law to put a customer operable isolator between the cut out / meter and the board / service splitter ... customer very lucky to have got away relatively lightly but (assuming they were on site when it happened) with an isolator they could have removed the source of ignition before the service fuse went ..... might already have been too late to make the damage less than it was but on the other hand might have helped a bit.
Absolutely spot on one of the reason we have now under our code all external disconnects. I actually spent having them done.
I have an overhead supply with the DNO's supply cable running through my loft then dropping into the meter cupboard. The CU is mounted below the meter board so if my CU burned with the ferocity that the one in the video clearly did it would have set fire to the meter board destroying the meter, cut-out and the insulation off the end on the DNO's supply cable. So although I have an isolator switch, mounted on the meter board, it wouldn't help in the least with a similar fire. There is an in-line fuse in the cable just outside the house but its 30 ft above the ground and spliced into the supply cable, so not exactly convenient to pull in an emergency.
Yeah, but that might cost the DNO a couple of quid extra and that isn't going to happen.
They will merrily chuck in Smart Meters, running into ancient Consumer units, and then when that board finally is going to be upgraded, I have to call them back in to put a switch in - and they charge the customer around £50. I'm sure they must be paying the contractor more than that to come back and do it, so why not just do it as standard anyway, especially if the consumer unit isn't fairly new and is probably going to be changed in the near-ish future?
It's just a pain in the arse trying to decide whether to cut the seals on the main fuse when they have only been on for a couple of months, rather than having to wait a fortnight for them to come back and put a switch on so I can disconnect and replace the consumer unit. (And of course, we never cut the seals, right guys? ;-) )
@@Mr.MFuckingYTchangedmyname It isn't the DNO that installs smart meters, its the metering companies contracted by the energy suppliers.
@@davidfaraday3085 Gimme a break, I've only just got out of the habit of referring to the Electricity Board, haha!
Of course, I used "DNO" there incongruously, for the sake of brevity - really meaning "Them" (upstream of the consumer's installation) as opposed to "Us" (the end user or those of us needing to safely disconnect the supply whenever necessary).
I didn't really want to get into DNO/Meter Operator/Energy Supplier relationships and who does what, but at the end of the day, it's the DNO's network and they must have some sort of agreement with those they contractually allow to install equipment.
It's surely not beyond the wit of man to ensure that an isolator is fitted whenever new cutouts/meters are installed or altered, by the aforementioned "Them", so that a safe disconnection can be made easily and conveniently? Or, they should stop getting shirty about cut seals and pulled fuses!
Nice clean work. So different seeing not 120/240v 60hz. In Us branch circuits are going Combo arc fault/ magnetic overload breakers. Just a lower MA trip here.
Guy with Batman cap. Top lad! Great work in this video. Learning so much from you mate. Keep up the good work.
Great video and the finished job looked neat and very professional. I think the assumption that the fire was probably caused by a slack terminal is right and as another commenter had pointed out that there is an important difference between torque and tightness as over tightening can cause significant damage and stress on a terminal. I would point out that I am not an electrician but my life has been spent in the aerospace industry where instruction on torque tightening was a full 2 day course! The other point is that had the CU been a metal unit and sealed correctly then the fire would most likely have been contained and avoided a lot of the damage. My CU is in my attached garage and I have a smoke/heat detector in there for peace of mind. Keep up the good work and finally thank you for the effort you put in to produce some excellent content which we can all benefit from.
I really liked this video, was cool seeing you two diagnose the mess at the beginning in almost real time. Nice little change of pace, especially having a camera guy for some of it.
@7:33 You can always tell a 6mm from a 10mm from the earth, 6 has the single solid core where as 10mm has the multiple stranded cores for the earth.
are you familiar with 6mm cable?
Hint, 6mm isn't solid core.
@@TheChipmunk2008hes refering to just the earth core in them 2 different sized cables :)
@@TheChipmunk2008 im clearly just talking about the cpc. Are you familiar with 6mm pvc? Or are you that unaware?
@@bluke5285 Don't know what your electrics are like, but you need to work on your English grammar. Your comment is ambiguous at best but in its current form it does imply that 6mm, 10mm and earth were different items. Lack of punctuation seems to be the problem. Just saying.
Brilliant job guys, its great to say that a visible hatch is needed in that bathroom for the junction extentions, people would just tell the customer to plaster board it in. The water pipe that was hanging off the wall where you were working would have bugged me, dont ask me why but I would have been scared in case I snagged on it and burst it, so I would have secured it to wall. I feel sorry for the bloke of that house. But still a brilliant job you did.
Why does it need to be accessible??
Have a look into cable identifiers (tracers), clip it onto a de-energised cable and walk around with a probe. Don't need to take off accessories either, saves a lot of time. It sends out a pulse on the cable and the battery operated receiver picks it up. They claim to be 100% accurate with no false positives.
I've got a relatively cheap one and definitely wouldn't say 100% accurate but if you've got access to the other end of the cable you're looking at, you can short it and if the signal disappears, you've found it. Connect the tester to a socket or lighting point, hold the receiver to the wires in the CU and if it picks up on several, short line and neutral one by one until the signal goes out.
@@Ragnar8504 Which one do you have out of interest, not sure if I misquoted the manufacturer but the one I saw was the Megger CI (Cable Identifier). They claim never to have false positives, but doesn't say anything about accuracy of not picking up the pulse on a dead cable.
I’m really glad we don’t have to deal with ring circuits in the US. But I do wish we would adopt the concept of fuses in plug heads. Seeing people chain multiple 16awg extension cords plugged into a 15 amp circuit always makes me cringe.
Things would be a lot better already if *just* extension leads were required to be fused.
I'm glad we've always had metal enclosures in the US.
Just before this video started ,there was a fireguard advert,very appropriate.
Top video mate. Makes you realise the importance of tightening things up properly.
It's not a game we're playing, people can die due to sloppy installation.
I love how neatly you have done everything.
Fire sealant is a must over here, good little fine in the mail if you get picked with a gap bigger then 5mm2 and then every job is checked for how ever many
Is putting everything on individual RCBOs the preferred way now?
Oh, and hi from Big Clive's channel!
Strongly preferred, but not essential. With Dual RCD, if one trips you lose half the circuits. John Ward does some good videos explaining the differences. See here czcams.com/video/WNe1xHlI5i4/video.html
I wouldn't get a consumer units without individual RCBOs as they are far less annoying as you only have to work out what's on that circuit that's causing the trip instead of losing half the house and having to work out witch circuit first is causing the tripping
@@leexgx I would agree and do the same myself, but there is a cost difference which means that dual RCD units are still being installed. Annoyance is one thing, but the person building the house isn't the one who will be annoyed. Imagine how much fun it must be in the older houses with single RCD protection...
@@gavinminion8515 Hands up, lived in an older house that was single except the new basement wiring, which was a different rating and had its own box for a while. Not fun. Was super grateful when our new box was individual.
What I don't understand is ours has dual but they put all the sockets and lights on one side, bloody moronic. Surely upstairs lights and downstairs sockets on one side, reverse on the other, would make more sense? That way if it trips on the lights you can always plug in a lamp while checking for the problem.
Great work Nick & Congratulations to Adam for learning his skills. Being an electricians is like artwork of cable management which done right, looks awesome to have some pride over it. Excellent video Nick... Keep them coming bro.
What wonderful work - a long day yes but starting from the disaster you were faced with at 8 am to finish with such a neat and safe job at 8 pm deserves a pat on the back. Just a pity you're too far away to be my go to electrician.
I'm not an electrician, but I can see you guys took the time and effort to do a great job. You even went the extra mile by adding a light switch. Too many trades people just want to be in and out as quickly as possible or are too lazy to do the job right.
A tone tracer can save you a lot of time on jobs like this, I'm surprised how few electricians have them or have even heard of them.
Well done on doing a great job, Should suggest to the customer to fit a smoke detector in the garage. Another great video
Good idea
Heat detector for garage
Not an electrician but I’m astounded by your professionalism! Meticulous working out of what was a horrendous s**t show!!!
Great work, neat job, staying late to finish it. You're good lads for others to follow. Adam is lucky to have you.
I've worked on 500kW HF transmitters that "let the smoke out", but rarely seen a mess as bad as that! Plastic consumer units, who thought up THAT bright idea?!
I think it was to prevent electric shocks from older badly installed metal boards
Very scary and very lucky - could definitely have been quite nasty! Excellent job dealing with all of that, it cannot have been fun!
Brilliant bit of workmanship fantastic board well done guys
Send it to Big Clive 😆
I'm here from Big Clive's teardown of the burnt remains 😁
It's good Adam has seen fire damage and how to tackle the testing I feel this can only be done in the field as each fire damages are different, well done Adam good job
Agreed. I fix cars, and an apprentice hasn't truly learned until they have seen consequences and how things can go wrong. This one is a free-bee for Adam.
Good video guys, what a mess that was. Welldone for sorting your way through that and not just hacking it apart in a rush.
My college years learning as an electrician were cut short, but I've learnt more on site and helping along the way. I'm shocked at some of the so called professional work I come across and thats from from a novice like me!!
Enjoy all your work, its informative, professional and enjoyable to watch....keep the videos coming lad 😁👍
Did 5 yrs apprenticeship ,its when you come out of your " time " that you really start to learn because you don't normally have someone to fall back on .
Neatest fuseboard install.
Excellent job. If I ever need an electrician I hope I'll find one this good.
There is something very distinctive about the smell of burnt electrical equipment. Great bit logical thinking sorting out the final circuits from a chard mess
Great job on sorting out that charcoaled consumer unit. Brilliant result at the end.👍🏼 Adam is doing really well with all his testing knowledge. 👏🏼
Very clean job.
Great video, the white beads in the cavity wall (meter cabinet) look like expanded polystyrene - will damage the PVC insulation over time. John Ward has a video on the subject amongst others. Worth advising the occupier of the risk. 👍
Wow thats mad
What a lovely job you made of that unit. Very impressive work mate. A Real Credit to you. I bet the customer was made up with the result.
Very good work lads, that's probably the best Electricians video on CZcams. Class!!.
Mate that's terrifying, they were very lucky. Cracking job on your work.
You two are exceptional. Brilliant job, very compliant, my bullshit detecter meter was set to high, as I've been an electrical engineer for 43 years. You didnt trigger my meter once. You might be getting a phone call.
I can feel that black soot at the back of my throat just watching this video.
I worked in a homeless shelter when one of the smackhead residents decided to light some candles under her TV, shoot up, and pass out. Had to run up to her room, fight through the thick black smoke from her burning TV, and drag her out. I could taste that burnt plastic for about a week!
Liking the battery hover! I have one too. Handy bit of kit
Looking at the fire damage it looks as if most of the damage is above the MCB's and RCD's so id make a guess that it was a loose connection on the neutral bar. Unless that's the remains of the main switch hanging down then as you say a possible loose connection there...
I torqued my MK one a few months ago and the main neutral connection was quite loose. Board installed 2010. Not something you think of checking. Maybe we need to have an "annual maintenance check" ... Oh yes we do it's the EICR :) but only on demand.
Ever since my mother ignited a chip pan in our kitchen and I saw the damage fire scares the cra* out of me. Keep up the good work BUNDY10....
Looking at the MCB the NSB type where recalled due to setting on fire. I’ve replaced a couple of these
I was tempted to order the Enviroburst when CJR demo'd it a few videos ago. Bit the bullet and ordered it now.
Top wiring job mate!
Cor I know exactly what that garage stanks like! I did a rewire on a property that had fire damage throughout. Rank!
Great video 👍👍
What a good example to show these fly by night so called electricians in London how they can effect someone's life with shoddy work. A big wake up to the owners not to hire said people as Cheap in not cheap in the long run....?? As to the final work in video above. You can be very proud of the work you have done. Thanks for sharing.
Excellent job nick,
That looked like a fecking nightmare of a job. But you and Adam got it sorted , well done lads 👍👍
Fantastic video as always
Nice job. Doing a great job with Adam. He is knocking out the park.
Holy crap! What a mess to have to clean up! Is this how they wire houses in the UK?!
Just ordered some EnviroBurst and Intumescent strip for my shed DB... that looked a tough job to unpick and re-connect. Great job both!
Nice finish
Wonder how far along the cables the heat was conducted. Nice and hot.
Firefighters wear medical gloves under GP gloves. This may help you when dealing with the crispy CU. Guessing the smell is horrendous. Will smell for a while.
Great job. Well done!
Yes burnt electrics smells fishy.
That’s a proper graft for a day’s work 👍🏻
This may sound stupid but wouldn't it of been easyier to just put new tails in than putting a Henley box🤷♂️ either way great vid never get used to the smell BTW 😂
Suppose it makes it easier to add a new feed for a vehicle charger at a later date?
I was thinking the same. Especially as Western Power would of connected it into their new isolator anyway.
not allowed to connect tails to mains must be done by power provider eg scottish power can only fit the consumer side
I came here from Big Clives' autopsy of the melted board, he agreed with your diagnosis of poorly torqued connections on the main switch.
What a nightmare! Looks like the installers made some other bad joints around the building from the other high resistance faults that you picked up.
I watched bigclive also and fromwhat I"ve garhered in viewing most all the video's is on frame 927 in this video the loose neutral ground is the main fault meltdown - fire. Bad grounds are sneaky and inconsistent. Once the inconsistency of a solid ground heat begins to generateuntil this point when it goes poof...
That new board is beautiful. Nice work.
It's great seeing how much Adam is learning!!
Lovely work guys
That looked like hard work
Kids.. That's why you want a steel cabinet grounded for your fuses! Fire contained and with heavy ground any mainfuse will blow, ground it also to the water tubes if they are copper it gives tremendous ground carrying capacity
Years ago in the auto industry we were warned never too touch burnt cables due to hideous carcinogenic problems. Don't know if household cables are the same but fire service back it up. I know you wore gloves eventually but try to never touch the stuff, we were told some horrific stuff.
makes me kinda glad we never had plastic main panels over here in the usa and if there was ever a fire in the circuit breaker panel there is a secondary cutoff as that is how my moms house was designed that ya could get to if it was safe to get to it
That's a hell of a sexy new board you've wired up. Fantastic dressing 👍
Hello from America, very interesting on how different we are when it comes to electricity. Enjoy watching your videos, just a bit of terminology barrier but I am learning.
This is definitely an eye opener, great job sorting out the mess. It should be a legal requirement that every installation has a regular eicr. I also hope that afdd's become more affordable, a belt and braces approach.
A customer called me the other day asking for an additional socket outlet in the kitchen, upon investigation, the kitchen sockets are on a spur. I said this needed to be a separate ring final as the current set up is not safe. The customer didn't want her kitchen touched, i walked away.
I think i made the right decision.
You could change to a 20A MCB if they don't want any destructive work done.
@@stevenbrooks8323 Doing that derates the only ring final circuit in the entire house, so not really an option.
good work he really knows.
This video really shows why metal cased CU are better than the old plastic ones at containing a fire.
cjr did a videoon consumer board fires.. he had a plastic tube you put inside the board and if it catches fire it pops and puts out the fire..
Smashed that mate well done lads 👏👏 fault finding obviously it’s the last socket you check 🙈🙈
yep, dont know anyone who keeps on looking after they find something...
Good video Nick/Adam. Looks a tails/ main switch issue to cause that sort of fire issue. Thank god we’ve gone back to metal boards. I can imagine the smell was pungent!
Disappointing that a modern board with supposably modern safety features can suffer from such a catastrophic failure.
Well done both of you, for a rescue of a electrical installation.
Pick up an induction toner and wand, and you can trace out the circuits without power. Used by IT people. I've used them for power wiring before. I sincerely admire your persistence with the fire damage. I hate electrical fire damage - you can never get it cleaned out of equipment.