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Thread: Aussie are dumber than Kiwis...

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    Default Aussies are dumber than Kiwis...

    Did anybody read Silicon Chip from June 2008
    about DIY electrical work?
    Here is the abstract if you don't have the mag:


    Safety stats show that KIWIS are better off despite Gov supported DIY than we are.
    Also with fire hazards.

    I have done an electrical/electronic course in Germany and I can safely say that I have not seen one residential installation done by a licenced electrician in Australia that would get an approval in Germany.
    I consider all these installations a fire hazard as power points here are daisy chained on a single circuit with a 20A breaker. I have even seen 25A. So anybody can plug in a Chinese elcheapo power board rated @10A connected to two heaters each 2kW or more and the breaker won't give a damn, while the power board starts smouldering under the curtain.

    However in Australia, in my own house I am now legally not even permitted to unscrew a power point to paint around it.

    Like to hear your opinions on this.



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    As an holder of an electrical A & B tech cert (in NZ) I'm am allowed to do a bit more than the general Joe Blo, I find it ridiculous to say the least. No doubt a sparky will be along shorty to argue their clause.

    I have that issue of SC, and I reckon they will have the heckles of the electrical board up. They are basically saying to the Aussies lads to go get the info from NZ sites and give the Electrical trade the finger lol.

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    Ok, I am a sparky in New Zealand, and there are aspects of the electrical regulations here that I have issues with.

    There are many things that a householder may legally do, such as replace a power point, repair a cord on a fixed appliance (toaster etc), change a light socket and so on.
    The problem with this is that people take the liberty of doing a lot more than just what is prescribed, and ultimately end up with a dangerous situation.

    There is a forum here attached to our version of Ebay - and quite often I see questions posted such as "I am trying to rewire my power point and I have two black wires, three red wires and a green. I have put the black wires in the terminal marked '3' and the red wires into terminal '1' and it still won't work. What have I done wrong?"

    I see questions like this and shudder. People should not be attempting this kind of work when they have absolutely NO idea what they are doing. I've come across dozens of situations where this type of work has been carried out and left hotpoints with transposed phase, neutral and earth - no earth at all, or phase and no neutral with earth as the return.

    I've dealt with caravans that have been run off dodgy extension cords, no RCD, no earthing on the feed and one particular caravan that was live on the chassis and had been for some time.
    It is amazing that more people have not been killed from these dodgy practices.

    Whilst we do have electrical regulations here, it is rare that a job is ever done to the absolute spec of the regs - in many cases it is simply not possible to carry out work in this manner.
    The other problem is that the Electrical Wiring Regulations often conflict with the Electricity Act (which is the over-riding factor).

    NZ has long been known as a country of "can do" people and DIY here is a big part of the Kiwi way of life. Unfortunately, people often think that extends to electricity as well.

    Whilst I have no problems with technically able and competent people doing their own work around the house, far too many people don't have a clue about how to wire safely - and the issue is how to distinguish between the two.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Studio1 View Post
    I've dealt with caravans that have been run off dodgy extension cords, no RCD, no earthing on the feed and one particular caravan that was live on the chassis and had been for some time.
    It is amazing that more people have not been killed from these dodgy practices.
    The occupants must be wearing gumboots

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    I think the real problem is the ETU has done their best to keep their trade a protected industry. I respect that in terms of them serving there member interests it’s simply wrong to say anyone who has not served a four year apprenticeship is a danger to public safety.

    Prior to the last election the ETU was running a campaign to keep the apprenticeship as a four years term rather than a two year one which was being proposed.

    I take the point re peoples DIY efforts and asking which wire goes where and share the fear of the result but why can’t there be say a part time tafe course to safely qualify people to perform simple tasks.

    I am qualified in electronics and worked in industrial electronics for many years. For that I had a restricted electrical license which allowed me to work on fixed wiring on a very wide range of things.

    At the time I simply had to go to the electrical inspector’s office and answer a few questions and perform a practical exercise which was to disconnect a 3 phase motor, tag the circuit with a warning label.

    I don’t work in that area now but was still paying the license renewal to keep my options open until the license became more restrictive. First you had to have formal qualifications that one was no problem then they categorised what work you could do so you could only work on very specific types of equipment. I’ve worked on x ray machines, huge printing, plastics equipment, robotic systems. They also incresed the cost so I dropped it as i was not using it.

    I can’t see why there is not an option to allow suitably skilled people to perform simple tasks such a changing a power point without the need to do a four year apprenticeship.

    I am not sure of the status of this now but there was something going on in Queensland a while ago that I read about where unless you where a licensed electrician you could not fix televisions or white goods. Give me a break.

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    You know I put my hands in TV's and microwaves with volts around 25kv
    but I still refuse to play with customers power points and light fittings etc.. I leave that for the sparkys, just common sense tells me that
    When you do things right, people won't be sure that you have done anything at all

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    Quote Originally Posted by best4less View Post
    You know I put my hands in TV's and microwaves with volts around 25kv
    but I still refuse to play with customers power points and light fittings etc.. I leave that for the sparkys, just common sense tells me that
    But surely to be "quallified" to do that you would have had to pass the restricted elec course for 240v in QLD ??
    The way I look at is if you are 100% positive in what you are doing , no probs.If you need to ask that should be where you stop.
    For those of you who need to know.
    I'm a maintenance fitter that had completed the restricted 240v theory course , but due to having problems with quallified sparky's signing off my log book never got the liscence.(will chace this up when it makes a difference to my pay)

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    I am not talking about doing work for other people but clearly you have the mechanical ability to repair a microwave so by extension I suspect you’re also capable to unscrewing a power point and I would be willing to bet you could identify active, neutral and earth. You do not need to complete a four year apprenticeship to change a power point its nonsense.

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    I am just scared of power points LOL
    When i was 7 years old I got my brothers Variable capacitor from a AM radio
    and hooked it straight up to the 240 volts Maybe i need to see a shrink to get over it LOL



    I am just trying to make Kiwi's look smart
    When you do things right, people won't be sure that you have done anything at all

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    Queensland has the harshest licensing restrictions and only got them because it has the highest death rate amongst the region for electrically related issues. I have my QLD restricted and it's the only state in Australia that requires me to do an entire apprenticeship to get a full license. The fact is I've seen the installs for TV antennas and cat5 done buy fully licensed electricians that wouldn't even pass a short test let alone Austel standards.
    Northern Australia's electricians are the same guys that think that harder licensing rules will make their jobs safer because lets face it increased competition would bankrupt the majority of them. I don't care that they don't like the truth in that regard but thats it. The inspectors up this way must love their easy money jobs too.

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    Before I rabbit on about electrical matters it would be appropriate to mention I have been involved with electrical power some 40 odd years, my experience ranging from general house hold wiring, rewinding of electrical motors, single and 3 phase, using growlers, external and internal, repairing B&D, wolf, marketa etc hand tools, repairing gensets, even making an electric gun for a university, automotive electrical, ranging from 12v to 24v and even leadding in 48 vDC telecom exchange gear. That said and done lets read on.

    Goods sold without plugs on and keeping fingers out of the works.

    Don't know if this has been posted elseware, but back in 93 the family and I happened to travel to the old dart, there I saw white goods being sold without power plugs attatched to the ends of the power cords. I had hurd this was happening, but to actually see this with my own eyes was a shock.

    It's true, enquiring further, it is english practice to sell an appliance as such, when the general public takes it home, he or she is alowed to wire up the mains plug. (It may be changed by now).

    Now, we in australia have many deaths relating to electrocution, why?

    I was apprentished as an electrical mechanic in New Guinea, over the years I have come accross many situations where electrical products have been incorrectly wired up, the main ones which come to mind is, dodgy power extension cords, I have seen A on N, N on E and even A on E. Shocking.

    In 91 I was in Toowoomba Base Hospital, one day the nurse brought in a medical instrument fittered with a clear 3 pin plug, being curious, I gander at the "insides", the N and A were transposed, when I brought this to the attention of the "establishment" it was wisked away to be "repaired" with the questioon, how did I know it was faulty? Wounder who put the plug on in the first place?

    I have seen loose frayed insulation/old cabling in a house I rented many years ago that still had the old TRS wiring in it, I found this because the power point was loose on the wall. siiiii.

    Getting back to my original question about electrical deaths in australia, why does it happen? Because we are human beings, we make mistakes, even those who have cirtificates as long as their arms.

    It is made worse by calling all electrocution as the cause of death, instead of was he or she trained to carry out the work? and seperate the careless ones from the trained ones.

    Then again, a farmer drives his grain auger poking up high, collides with the power cables and he dies, and he wasnt even fiddling about with the electrical system. So it seems to me all electrocutions are piled together, it matters not if one was trained, or it was an accident.

    So how does one get the point accross to young people, don't fiddle with electrical things?

    One of my young kids were asking questions, how does electricity kill you? (I cought her poking something in a power point), so I set up an experiment containing a single power point in a clear area where it could be safely be observed.

    I stripped some fig 8 lead about 3 inches, and bridged just a single strand of wire accross the A and N on the power point, then using a woodern pole (broom handle) switched it on.

    There was a loud bang, flame shot out about 6 inches, the observers eyeballs poked out on stalks, yelled in fright, shaking, they said, wow I'll keep my fingers out from those things for now on.

    A bit drastic but I know they won't fiddle with power now. (sometimes kids wont listen to mum or dad).

    So whats the answer to all this? when kids get to high school, teach them to respect mum and dad, the police, people in authority and teach them how to be curtious and how to drive a car, all before they leave school.
    Ram it down their throats.

    I'm sorry if you are a SNAG or are a sensitive person reading this, but electricity kills without respector of persons.

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    New Guinea electrics... I can only imagine what they're capable of.

    I had to work with many nationalities in East Timor under the UN.
    Different nations with different power standards are interesting enough.

    110V/220V/240V, 50Hz/60Hz. Just to name a few of the combinations.

    Running UPS on 240V 60Hz. The UPS detects a fault (because it is 60Hz) switches to battery. Runs the batteries down, the UPS then default connects the power through. The circuit then runs normal and the batteries charge up in the mean time. When the batteries float, the UPS goes back into a protected mode and then sees the 60Hz and the whole cycle repeats over and over. Arrgh !

    I was asked by my boss to check someting out for him. He took me outside onto the front lawn and then asked, "Is that power or phone?" pointing at the grass. I looked at the ground, then looked at him and then looked at the ground again. "Say what ?" I though he was tripping !
    He pointed again.... look closely... there !
    I watched the grass carefully for a few seconds and then noticed sparks jumping between blades of grass.
    Arrgghhh ! Stand back !! That's a 3 phase 415V leak !!! One of the phases in the underground cable had obviously corroded. I came back with a multimeter to measure ground potential for a metre around it. Yep about 300 volts.... nasty. I was expecting somebody to be found dead there one day, they never did fix it.

    Then there was town power in Dili, when it wasn't blacked out the phases were the most entertaining thing to watch. Phase A would drop from 240V to below 50V then black out for 20-30 seconds before coming back up to ~240V again.
    Then at a different time, Phase B would brown out and drop to about 120V for 10 seconds before returning to 240V. The C phase would be a constant 250-260V and never ever drop below 240V.

    Then there was the UN themselves. One day they did a generator changeover. Most single phase devices could handle a changeover no problems, but some three phase devices do not appreciate the phases being reversed. You can imagine what happened. Lucky this was just a small 300kVA
    rather than some of the bigger generators.

    Occasionally you'd see something creative like a set of vehicle jumper cables on the overhead power lines. Supprisingly enough the monkey who was obviously brave enough to connect such an arrangement also had enough smarts to put a fuse in before distributing it to his neighbours so that the authorities couldn't tell which one of them was responsible.
    They even went so far as to put a meter on the pole beside the fuse to make it look like they were actually paying for the electricity, just in case they didn't notice the red and black aligator connections

    But my all time favourite was the Jordanians. I suspect that they have the only army in the world where an electrican has a shorter lifespan than a frontline section scout.

    I could always tell power cables in a Jordanian base, they were Blue. They had eight strands and each of the eight strands was indivually colour coded with combinations of blue, orange, green, brown and white. (yes Cat5).
    They would buy it from a local hardware store, coincidentally, the same store also sold australian standard 3 wire flex. Obviously too expensive.

    I only wish I'd taken a photo of the distribution panel in front of the generator. Apparently, the Cat5 also can be used as a fuse. Use a single strand, when that blows, use two strands.. and so on !


    Personally I like the idea of letting natural selection work it's magic on the human population, weeding out the bad genetic material !

    FIRE is the ultimate teacher. It commands respect and if you make a mistake or doubt your responsibility, the lesson learned is NEVER forgotten.

    Every kid on the farm learns that when dad says don't touch the fence, you don't touch the fence. If you don't believe him, well go right ahead.

    Respect not given is respect soon earned.

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    I am a registered electrician in New Zealand
    There are many things that a householder may legally do, such as replace a power point, repair a cord on a fixed appliance (toaster etc), change a light socket and so on.
    The problem with this is that people take the liberty of doing a lot more than just what is prescribed, and ultimately end up with a dangerous situation.
    I seen things that the home owner has done that would make your hair stand up
    what the home owners dont know is if there house burns down due to the work they have done ,do they have insurance or do they lose there cover?
    or if they kill someone end up In jail shit leve the work the the electricians and "quallified" to do that work

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    I have seen work from "qualified" electricians that make my hair stand on end.

    The point is, wouldn't it be better to have a government supported information program also in Australia to educate people to do simple work like replacing a powerpoint or light switch or fitting in their own house safely and correctly, rather than making everything DIY now illegal?

    Those who can't afford a professional will continue to muck around on their own.
    Wouldn't it be better if they had easy access to clear and concise guidelines to enable those who have general craftsman abilities to do the work properly. This is clearly not rocket science.
    If an Electrical supplier or even Bunnings can sell electrical components to the general public then they should also supply these guidelines by law.

    A statistic showed there were only 4 fatal electrocutions in one year in NZ and these appeared to be not even domestic.

    How many hundreds are killed on the road and tens of thousand injured just in NSW every year?
    If I were to follow the motives of this Nanny state then I would suggest that driving should be permitted only by those who are qualified to do that job, i.e public transport.

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    You don't need bunnings etc for the info, it's all there on the web. I knew a guy that did all his own wiring on a little flat he built himself read up on all the standards on and best wiring practice books, then did a %110 job. I finished the sub board, sub mains upgraded the consumer mains and altered the main switch board for multi domestic, but was glad to put my name to his work as he had make the effort and done his home work. Sadly this is not so with most DIY people. I have always said, "Sure do it yourself, but make sure you do it the way a sparky would. Other wise when your house burns down and the insurance guy finds 0.75mm extension lead cable use to add another power point, he's going to say, see us in court for your money". Although lighting is good for sparkies as a customer is so embarrassed they will pay any amount to sort out the batten holder they tried to change. Now either every time they turn it on the fuse blows or they just can't turn the light off. So very basic to the trained but to the untrained they can't under stand, after all they put all the reds together and all the blacks together. So why won't it work? Some people think if it works it's ok, like the guy that proudly showed me the great job he did of light and power in his back shed. He had 1.0mm figure 8 flex run along a colour bond fence. Yes his lights worked but if every plugged in something that sucked a bit of power that cable was going to weld it's self to their fence and kill next doors dog.
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    Ok... so what's the solution here ?

    What is the best way to ensure that community standards are met?

    Lets take worst case scenario.
    You're buying a house, how do we ensure that the internal wiring is up to spec ?

    I figure that if there is a standard set of tests that can be applied to a house, then it should be able to be issued with a certificate from a licenced tester or a sparky who can sign off on the job.
    After all, the whole point is to make somebody accountable for any malpractise.

    Each GPO could be tested in 5 seconds to make sure the wiring is correct A-N-E.
    Building Earth is suitable.
    Fuse ratings correct etc.

    All the simplest definable qualities that can be tested for quickly and easily.
    So a house owner can say that their house wiring passes, or some other authoritiy can sign of on the standard.

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    Quote Originally Posted by trash View Post
    I watched the grass carefully for a few seconds and then noticed sparks jumping between blades of grass.
    Arrgghhh ! Stand back !! That's a 3 phase 415V leak !!! One of the phases in the underground cable had obviously corroded. I came back with a multimeter to measure ground potential for a metre around it. Yep about 300 volts.... nasty.
    That's it, I am changing my walking habits from now on. Only smallest possible steps while in Asia.

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    There has talk of bringing in electrical inspections when buying a house just like the pest inspections but never got past a little talk. There just has to be a point in life were a line in the sand gets draw, after all the average dude is not allowed to do the old pen in the throat trick to save a chocking man that is doctors only even if you have learned about it in first aid.
    It's hard to make a come back when I havn't been anywhere
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    Quote Originally Posted by nomeat View Post
    The point is, wouldn't it be better to have a government supported information program also in Australia to educate people to do simple work like replacing a powerpoint or light switch or fitting in their own house safely and correctly, rather than making everything DIY now illegal?
    I have built and wired 2 houses, have been doing most of my own electrical disconnects and reconnects in factories. and now you tell me it's illegal!..

    The only person I know who doesn't do her own replacements of power points etc, is my mother.
    and as for "daisy chaining" power points etc as is done in Australia, instead of tapping a ring main as is done in civilised countries, there is a good reason for this, and I wish that someone would tell me what it is.

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    Same good reason most sparks wont give a fixed price for a safety switch, sure it takes a few minuets to install it then a couple of hours finding the power point with neutral and earth transposed causing the RCD to trip or the call backs caused by similar dodgie hacks.
    It's hard to make a come back when I havn't been anywhere
    I finally got my head together, now my bodies falling apart.
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