Isolate power to fit new CU

adwt2004 · 5 Jan 2009

We have a family electrican coming to change our CU for us. The set up is pictured below. With the meter pictured is there a way of taking the power off without having to get the DNO involved?

Untitled

adwt2004
12 Dec 2008
2

Does anyone recognise this particular meter?

Andy

RF Lighting · 5 Jan 2009

Your electrician should really get the DNO involved, but it is not unknown for the seal fairy to visit the night before the electrician is due...

The meter is a bog standard digital meter. Looks like it is made by ampy automation, but I may be wrong.

adwt2004 · 5 Jan 2009

So the dno would remove the fuse from the beige thing below the meter and not touch the meter at all? BTW i have no plans to do this or subject someone i care about to do it but i am interested.

I did think there might be some kind of isolator on the meter so the dno wouldn't be involved.

RF Lighting · 5 Jan 2009

The DNO should remove the fuse from the cutout (the beige jobby).

By the looks of things your meter tails will need upgrading as part of the CU replacement, so this will require some work on the meter.

Your meter may have an isolator built in. I cant see it. If it does, it will be behind the luggage lable looking thing on the bottom right of the meter.

Although it is not strictly how things should be done, you may find your electrician is willing to remove the fuse himself.

adwt2004 · 5 Jan 2009

Ok cheers for the advice, he is probably willing to so i save money but 100 quid or so versus something going wrong is not worth the saving.

Will have a look for the the isolator if there is one. Hopefully the dno (Western power distribution?) will fit an isolator or de-energise it for us.

you're right the cable is VIR and will need doing.

kai · 5 Jan 2009

It looks like the meter in my last home - behind the lugguage tag should be a round white plastic knob, and a small window with a 1 or 0 indicator.
Using a Red handled insulated electricians screwdriver, depress the white plastic knob (it has a slot in it), and rotate in direction of the arrow, when the 0 shows in the window, the supply is isolated. Reverse the procedure to reinstate supplies.

rssteve · 5 Jan 2009

and turn it off load if i was you. turn the fuse board to off before etc.

adwt2004 · 5 Jan 2009

That's really useful if that's the case. Would rather not break fuse tags, get dno in or have sparky work live so hopefully it will have some means of isolation. I will turn off the cu before doing it so load will be zero.

Hopefully that resolves things. I take it the meter tails going to cu can be changed safely once isolated too??

Spark123 · 5 Jan 2009

I don't think the meter tails are accessable, if not the only thing your electrician can do is terminate new tails into henleys and organise the DNO to connect into the meter.
Is your family spark a member of a competent person scheme?

adwt2004 · 5 Jan 2009

Yes. Will have to take a closer look. If they can't be changed then does the dno do that for free or do they require paying?

ban-all-sheds · 5 Jan 2009

If the meter does have an isolator built in, doesn't rotating it to off also release an interlock which then allows a cover to be removed to gain access to the outgoing terminals?

As for the DNO tails on the supply side, are they in such poor condition that they need replacing?

adwt2004 · 6 Jan 2009

well they are VIR cables for sure but they look ok. Potentially the cables feeding the CU are just dirty by the looks of things. Would rather poke around and check their condition with power off though. Interesting comments about the meter releasing an interlock, would make sense. How would the DNO or any electrician change the tails otherwise.

ban-all-sheds · 6 Jan 2009

Well the DNO could cut seals preventing access to the meter terminals.

It's access to everything before the meter that they want to restrict - on the outgoing side there are no revenue implications, only safety ones.

Lectrician · 6 Jan 2009

That meter does not look like one with an isolator to me.

RF Lighting · 6 Jan 2009

ban-all-sheds said:
As for the DNO tails on the supply side, are they in such poor condition that they need replacing?

My main issue was their CSA. It's difficult to size cables from a photo, but they only look to be 16.0mm² to me.

Lectrician said:
That meter does not look like one with an isolator to me.

Looks like one of these to me:

Ever wondered how that isolator works? I did

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Isolate power to fit new CU

kai

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