EICR reports

HUMBUG

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82036165#Comment_82036165

I'd rather get an EICR that is complete and accurate and not a 'hard sell' to rewire my property for £4800 when a new fuse board is all that is required. If I get a refund , I will ask the new electrician to do another EICR in a more professional manner. The C2 and C3 results were expected because there are no RCDs. What I didn't expect was a N→E fault where he said more investigation required. That latter type of fault could have been caused by the appliances that he didn't switch off (which he should have) while applying a 500v to my wire network. He said only appliances that have complex electronics needed to be switched off.

HUMBUG

The electrician who did the original EICR is now going to refund me in full as a gesture of goodwill. It's a pity that the first EICR didn't provide enough detail to convince me it was done in a thorough way and didn't provide adequate explanation for the limited tests or provided some context as to why he used the word 'Poor'. He looked at the age of the wiring/fusebox and assumed that it needed replacing even though the insulation and impedance test results were fine. The fusebox needs replacing , no doubt about that and I can see that for myself, but the condition of the wiring is another matter.

TroubledTarts

I always go on recommendations for EICR's we get about 5 every year over the rental and lived in properties spread out over the 5 years required between each certification and electricians come and go or get too busy.

Our latest one in Essex was superb, good value and no extras added on that were not necessary.

Ectophile

The OP has been a bit vague as to how old the actual wiring is.

PVC insulated cable was introduced into UK homes in the early 1960's. The great thing about PVC is that provided it's not been molested (overheated, gnawed by rodents, attacked by solvents…), it seems to last pretty much forever. The cable may be in the old colour scheme, and it may be in an old imperial size. But it will still function fine and pass an insulation test.

Prior to that, there was vulcanised rubber insulated (VRI) cable. There's still some of that around, but electricians are wary of it. It may test out just fine, but the moment you start pulling it about to rewire it into a new consumer unit, all the insulation crumbles and falls off. Think what happens to that old rubber band that's been in the back of a kitchen drawer for a few years. It looks fine until you try to stretch it.

Before that was cotton covered wire and paper insulated lead covered (PILC). Both are best donated to a museum. (But older pendant light flexes were cotton over PVC, and that's different)

QrizB

Back in the late 90s I was working in an industrial plant that had been built in the 50s. The site electricians didn't like to disturb the old VIR wiring as it would often fall apart in their hands and a 30-minute job to swap out a fitting would turn into an all-day rewire-back-to-the-distribution-board activity.

I seem to recall they would replace VIR with LSOH cable except where it needed MICC. Occasionally wondered about getting my house rewired in MICC just to mess with future electricians 😁

HUMBUG

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82037418#Comment_82037418

The electrician says my wiring is 70+ years old.

When I look at my old fuse box I can see one grey cable fed in from under the floorboard which I assume is for the wall sockets.

There is a grey cable being fed in from the ceiling which I assume are the light sockets.

There are 2 white cables also being fed in via the lintel of the door frame from the kitchen. I think one white cable is from the gas boiler , while the other is for the 'newer' wall sockets that were fixed back in 2001 when my kitchen was gutted and refurbished.

There is also a white cable from the electric shower unit that is fed into its own fuse box and then linked to the main fuse box.

There are 2 short wires (red and black) being fed from my main fuse box to the electric smart meter. These wires look like fabric rather than rubber and I wondered why 'Octopus Energy' contracted electrician didn't flag this up for replacement before fitting their smart meter. All he did was wrap each short wire with red and black insulating tape.

The internal wiring look like black and red with a bare copper earth wire for both the white and grey cables (unsure about the shower unit cable).

QrizB

Photographs would help here.

Ectophile

Older PVC cable is a light grey. The inner cores would be black and red, with a bare earth wire. Later on, manufacturers switched to white. And in the early 2000's the colours changed to brown and blue.

So there's every chance it's old PVC, not rubber.

HUMBUG

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82037685#Comment_82037685

This is under the stairwell in my property (the staircase is for the upstairs flat) . The other strange thing is the far right white power supply box is for the upstairs flat which looks a bit strange . Their electricians put in that box about 3 years ago for some reason. The far left white fuse box is only connected to my electric shower which was installed in 2001. It has a 30A fuse for a 9.5kw electric shower which has been fine for 25 years but now a like for like replacement will break the new rules as they want the old 6mm square cable to be replaced with a 10mm square one (with a 40A fuse and RCD).

Apparently there is no bonding to the gas supply . There is a section of my water piping that is blue plastic to the internal stopcock so unsure what they can do to earth water and central heating pipes (if that is necessary). I'm assuming they can take up some of the bare floorboards in my kitchen and then connect earthing wires from my water and central heating pipes to the gas supply pipe which is under the stairwell, as in posted photo.

Am I correct in assuming that the gas pipes are already earthed because they touch the earth? Therefore any electrified gas pipes are already made safe from me getting electrocuted? All that would be required is for my internal installations to also be earth connected to that gas pipe?

PS. Looks like I've got the above wrong.

"No bonding to the gas supply" means your metallic gas pipes are not connected to the property's main electrical earthing system. Bonding equalizes electrical voltage, so if a live wire accidentally touches the gas pipe, the electricity safely trips the fuse rather than causing an electric shock or gas explosion.

• Metal Supply Pipes: If your incoming gas main is metal, bonding is mandatory under wiring regulations. An electrician must run a protective earth cable from your main fuse box to the gas pipe (usually within 600mm of the meter).

• Plastic Supply Pipes: If the pipe entering your property is a yellow plastic pipe, it does not conduct electricity. In this case, bonding is often not required.

• Safety Codes: If an electrician or gas engineer identifies a missing bond, they may classify it as a potential danger on a safety certificate until it is fixed or confirmed safe.

HUMBUG

So if it's old PVC wiring , is there a need to replace it ? I've read that they can last up to 100 years.