Faulty socket spur

[tilla tech]

My sister had a fualty socket in her kitchen which intermitantly stopped working and then would start working again. The fauty socket ran off as a spur from an upstairs socket, upon investigation I found that the live conductor connection on the upstairs socket that ran to the faulty socket had soot on it.
I checked the no load voltage at the faulty socket and it showed 70v, but any load applied would drop it down to 0v. I assume the 70v is coz of the bad connection on the live conductor due to soot.

 

[didthathurt]

If, by the no load voltage, you mean that the voltage at the socket, between the Live and Neutral is 70V without anything plugged in then yes, you do have a problem. You should get a reading of between 220V and 250V (on a British Standard day). The sooting - probably due to a loose connection - could affect the connection between the live supply and the socket by increasing the resistance across that connection and causing a voltage drop (of, in your case, 160V across that connection). That's bad news and I'd expect that fitting to be getting hot. You must rectify this asap. Change the socket and strip the wire back a little to use new clean wire in the connections. Have a good look at the wire and make sure it has not suffered from the heat. Ideally, I think the insulation should be checked using a proper insulation tester.

 

[tilla tech]

Done what you mentioned. Works ok.
I couldnt work out where the 70V came from, but the soot thing explains it.

Thanks