Electrickery

Today a happy announcement: the electricity in the living room and bathroom nr. 2 stays ON! Since the new earth wire the "earth leakage circuit breaker" (ELCB) tripped, and we were without power. We narrowed the problem to the living and that bathroom, because they would trigger the problem. But what caused it? A spider in a socket? We were afraid of faulty wiring, as the "electrician" that installed the cables here is a damn *@$^^@(^6!Grr IDIOT (see below).

Anyway. Decided to disconnect everything, and see if there is a (change in) resistance between the two wires, or to earth. Removed those IKEA chandeliers first. Measured a resistance between the wires of 700Ω with open light switch. Flip the switch and it would be 78Ω. Odd, and not good. I expected ∞. Flipping the light switch for the bathroom made the resistance change too. Removed the lights in the bathroom. Still not good. What else. Ah, there still is that old wall ventilator. Cracked it open, and disconnected it. Ahhh.. now we're in the range of 17MΩ between the cables. Still not ∞, but the ELCB has not tripped since, so we're still good. (Fingers crossed.)

Yes, putting these blocks in plaster like that is a great idea. NOT.

Switches like these, with holes to stick a wire in, are intended for solid copper cables, NOT the multi-strand wires like these. Tinned it's a bit better.

Here we have a junction box, where wires in the wall are connected further. If you use multi-strand copper you need to tin the ends before screwing them tight in a block. Else you can just pull them out a few years later, like the visible copper. I could pull that out without unscrewing the block. Morons!

Here is a wall socket that was loose. Again, untinned wires just stuck in there.

Three wires in one hole, which does not fit, so you cut off half the strands. And you don't tin them, of course. F*cking idiots!

And no, this is not Spanish workmanship. So far we only encountered decent professionals here. This is British' work. Well, some 15 more switches and wall sockets await improvement. Things can only get better.