Help me find plastic light switches

mwarby

shaun_from_Africa said:

Hasbeen said:

Do you have a copy of the required electrical safety certificate?

Unlike gas systems, at present, there is no legal obligation for the landlord of a rental property to have an electrical safety certificate or an annual inspection. All that is required is that they have to ensure that the electrics are safe (including any appliances supplied as part of the rental) and have portable appliance testing done annually on any portable appliances supplied.

This is due to change this year (July) but may well get put back due to Covid.

I understand this is differnet in Scotland however, When I rented a few years ago I got a copy of the EICR(done a few days before) in the welcome pack

mwarby

FreeBear said:

FreeBear said: If it makes you feel any better, ordered some fancy black glass touch switches thinking "they'll be easy to fit"... Need to run a neutral wire to each switch, and also do some hacking to upgrade the firmware. Thought I was buying Sonoff smart switches, but getting some cheap(er) knock-offs instead.

Well, the cheap Chinese knock-offs turned up fairly quickly. Couldn't get them to work with the App... Fortunately, a near 100% clone of the Sonoff switches, so dead easy to flash new firmware (Tasmota) and integrate with the rest of my home automation setup.

I buy quite a bit of chinese electronics, but I'd be very nervous about having a knock off of an off brand switch connected to my house wiring 24/7.

FreeBear

mwarby said: I buy quite a bit of chinese electronics, but I'd be very nervous about having a knock off of an off brand switch connected to my house wiring 24/7.

Much of what everyone buys is made in China nowadays. Some of it is good quality, and occasionally, really nasty. Having pulled the PCBs out of the plastic housing, I'm reasonably satisfied with the design & construction - Plenty of space between the 240V sections and the low voltage parts. Traces are appropriately sized for the currents, and there are no parts exposed to the user once installed. The switches are also CE marked (for what it is worth).

mwarby

There’s a vast difference in both the quality of design and the QA/inspection processes between say an iPhone, a genuine sonoff (which as you say appear decent) and a knockoff son off. A CE sticker is worth very little as is a CE certificate backed only by a foreign company with no operations in the west, CE is only a company declaring compliance its no test that the items are compliant

you hinted at safety considerations, which would by my biggest worry. Other things worth considering are what happens if the device starts to glitch or stop working, it quite rare for a mechanical light switch to fail over say 30 years, not sure that an electronic one would last nearly as long