earthing chrome face plates

[1andrea]

I am in the process of changing my plastic face plates to chrome ones. I know that these have to be earthed ,do i just unscrew the earth that is already screwed onto the back box and screwinto the the back of the face plate?
Or do I have to run a short piece of earth wire from the back box to the face plate and leave the original where it is?
The face plates I am fitting have a piece of plastic under them once fitted does this make a difference to the way they are earthed?

thanks

 

[colport27]

My preference would be to put the existing earth into the plate with a short piece of earth wire back to the original position in the back box.
The piece of plastic that fits behind the plate is to stop any comtamination/dampness from the walls discolouring the chrome face of the plate.

 

[1andrea]

Hi thanks for taking the time to reply

I just looked at the one of the downstairs face plates that were chrome when i moved in fitted by the builders and the existing earth is fixed to the back of the face plate as you suggested but the short piece of earth wire is not there.

Should I do the downstairs with the short piece of earth wire too? any idas why th e electrician did not do this?

 

[Big_Spark]

Under current regulations there is no requirement to Earth the back box of switches or sockets, HOWEVER it is good practice to do so.

How you do it is a matter of personal opinion. I always connect the cpc's to the lug in the back box and run a flylead to the accessory faceplate. I have seen sparks run one to the faceplate, one to the back box and a flylead between...

I like to take the circuit cpc's to the back box because if you ever disconnect the faceplate, to change it etc, and the circuit is live, then you still have an Earth connection present that is not split for the rest of the circuit..but you should never work on live circuits anyway..mmmmm

 

[slippyr4]

Are your back boxes plastic or metal?

If plastic, then just run the earth straight to the switches earth terminal and don't bother with the back box.

If metal, then as stated above, add a new short piece of earth wire from switch to backbox. Sleeve in green and yellow.

You might need to go and buy a meter of 1mm T+E in order to pull the earth core out to use for this project.