Atlas Kablo (again)

[ccam108]

So after reading about the recall a few months ago and forgetting about it, today I was putting presents in the boot of my car and noticed the 2.5mm² cable I bought to wire my new flat was branded Atlas Kablo.

Now the problem is that I bought it about 9 months ago and the cable has been in plaster and under new carpet since the summer.

Has anyone got a list of affected batches?

I don't want to have to de-energise the circuits affected, as that would leave me with lights, the shower and the hob!

Colin C

 

[ban-all-sheds]

When you did your continuity, IR and EFLI tests did any results look odd?

 

[ccam108]

I found this which gave me some comfort as my cable is date-stamped 2009, however I now found this which says 2009 samples were defective also.

The extent of work was adding two short spurs to existing circuits and adding an additional double socket on the ring, so no tests were done at the time. I used around 10m of cable in all and took it as read that the resistance would be insignificant for the new cable compared to the existing ring wiring.

Where can I hire a tester to confirm the integrity of the circuits?

Colin C

 

[tonyelectric]

No tests, get on the naughty step

Don't know who would hire this kit, obviously us sparks buy it outright, but its expensive.

You could buy a test set on fbay and re-sell it after you've tested everything.

Or hire a spark to test it

Best Tony

 

[ccam108]

No tests, get on the naughty step

Already there when I told my wife there was a recall on the cable I used...

Don't know who would hire this kit, obviously us sparks buy it outright, but its expensive.

You could buy a test set on fbay and re-sell it after you've tested everything.

Anything in particular I should be searching for on eBay? I have seen the odd link crop up here for good deals.

Or hire a spark to test it

Got a spark mate, so he might be able to do it for a cup of tea... with any luck!

 

[tonyelectric]

You need an earth loop test meter and an insulation test meter. The older separate unit loop testers have got quite cheap now on ebay. For the insulation test you need a Megger or similar 500V tester, even one of the later grey crank up ones would do for the little task you need to undetake. I recently purchased a Fluke loop tester and a Fluke insul tester for £75 (the pair) on fbay as back ups. Most of these instruments hold their calibration pretty well but if you are looking to buy its worth plumping for something that looks only lightly used or has been recently calibrated.

As a rough calibration you can compare the readings from the instrument to one that is known to be in calibration or with the insulation meter by testing a few known value M Ω resistances.

Now on the basis your cable was extruded out as one long length you could get your mate to test another piece for you, I would megger it at 500 & 1000V if he has kit for this and check the resistance of the cores. However there is more to cable design than this, the BASEC accreditation may have been removed from Atlas Kablo because the PVC mix was found to degrade too rapidly in artifical ageing tests or some other problem that no functional test that you can try at home will prove or disprove.

 

[tonyelectric]

Of course to bring things down to earth, there is every chance what you installed will be fine, and fine for decades to come, Yes Atlas lost it's BASEC certification but they are still in business and other countries, albeit with lower standards than us are using it. Bear in mind too that there is a fair bit of old rubber insulated cable still out there that will have much poorer insulation qualites but may still go on for some years yet, and theres all the bodged up lights wired in bell wire, speaker flex etc, that against the odds have given years of trouble free service. So in all probability, your relatively minor use of a "dodgy" cable will probably not lead to any grief, but I suspect only BASEC's test labs could tell you for sure.

 

[JohnnyG]

...However there is more to cable design than this, the BASEC accreditation may have been removed from Atlas Kablo because the PVC mix was found to degrade too rapidly in artifical ageing tests or some other problem that no functional test that you can try at home will prove or disprove.

I believe they lost their licence due to their cables having insufficient copper so simple resistance tests would prove whether he has affected cable or not.

 

[ccam108]

Now that I think about it, would I be OK just testing the resistance of a cut length and comparing it to a calculated value? That would at least let me know if the cable was safe, and if not I can then test the circuits to see if the measurements are reasonable in use.

I'm a bit concerned about this as I have all electric heating supplied on the ring main (NOT my design!) If it was a low-power circuit, such as bedroom/living room appliances only then I wouldn't be so bothered, and would be happy to even just reduce the breaker size and split the ring if necessary.

 

[tonyelectric]

Yes a test of resistance of a known length will give you an indication, i'd be tempted to take say 10 mtrs, test it and compare to 10 metres of BASEC approved cable (longer length should give a bigger difference if their is one). If you have a vernier caliper or micrometer, measure the core diameter and again compare. if you want to get techy you could arrange a simple apparatus to test the hardness of the copper (which will give an indication to the nature of the metal, ie if its got zinc mixed in it will be harder, lead softer) by allowing a known weight to fall from a known height and observing the size of the dent in both Atlas and good cable. These could tell you the answer but again what I describe is pretty crude testing compared to what a materials lab would do

 

[Taylortwocities]

Now that I think about it, would I be OK just testing the resistance of a cut length and comparing it to a calculated value? .

You will need a low ohm meter to test short lengths as the resistance will be in milliohms. 2.5mm² copper cable has only got a resistance of 7.4mΩ so you would still need a proper calibrated test meter. A multimeter from maplins would not have the accuracy.

I agree with the above sentiments. More fool you for installing without proper testing.

 

[bernardgreen]

One problem with cable made with out proper quality control is "necking" in the conductors. Necking is when for some distance the diameter of a conductor is signficantly less than it should be.

It is almost impossible to detect short lengths of necking in a cable using end to end resistive measurements. Only by stripping the cable and measuring the diameter can necking be found. Or if the cable is in use at its maximum rating then a neck can create a noticable warming of the cable where the conductor is necked.

The dependency on quality control during manufacture is a very good reason to avoid buying "budget" cables whose manufactures may have cut costs in quality assurance processes.

 

[ccam108]

What do we all think of the following earth loop testers?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/DIGITAL-EARTH...Equipment_ET&hash=item1c180de7f0#ht_500wt_949

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ETHOS-7300-EA...Equipment_ET&hash=item1e6074dc6d#ht_500wt_949

 

[Taylortwocities]

I never did hear of Ethos.

Robin is a reasonable budget make - was bought up by Fluke a few years ago.

Bear in mind that the tester will only do one test. There are other tests that also need carrying out. If you plan on buying one tester for everything then you'll need a multifunction tester. Something like THIS but they cost ££££££

 

[tonyelectric]

The Megger shown by screwfix is excellent, I use this model myself, however from an electrical wholesaler with haggling expect to pay no more than £550, (I paid £450 a year ago)

The Robin is a good bit of kit and that is a very fair price, The Ethos is good too (made by Seaward for CEF), to do the tests the Megger can do you need the Robin/Ethos as shown plus an Insulation Tester and an RCD tester (you can leave out the RCD tester as that is not needed to test your cable, however you should check your RCD so maybe...)