How do I go about this?

[pete01]

A bit of toing and froing on this but for the time being have decided against learning electrics as I don’t feel I have the right mind set currently to do it. I might go back to learning woodwork, but who knows. Vicious cycle atm.

Why? you are the number 2 trade anyway as a pipe bender

 

[CountryFan]

Why? you are the number 2 trade anyway as a pipe bender

Don't know really. I don’t have a lot of free time to study, I easily lose concentration and would be better suited in a classroom environment. I get these pipe dreams now and again (not just because I’m a gas engineer ).

 

[ebee]

Quite so. AsI recently wrote, what is needed in such situations is a risk-benefit assessment/judgement/analysis - the outcome of which may vary very widely ....

In the case of seat belts, the probability of them doing harm is so low, and the probability of them doing good so high, that it is a no-brainer to conclude that, 'on balance', they are worth using. Much the same is probably true of "... crossing a road today/driving a car somewhere/ having a vaccination/ visit a GP surgery ".

However, the situation with bonding is not quite so clear cut. However, in many cases of 'unnecessary' bonding (certainly with some of the 'sillier' cases), it would seem that the probability of it 'doing good' is very small but, from the point-of-view of a person in contact with a live conductor/part, increasing the amount of 'unnecessarily earthed' touchable metal around (an inevitable consequence of some unnecessary bonding) will appreciably increase risk - so, on balance, the conclusion probably should be in favour of not installing unnecessary bonding (of otherwise unearthed things).

Yup I think we are pretty much in agreement (or not actually poles apart on that one John) the way I`d put it is :- Bonding, basically is usually a good idea, however there are quite a few instances where it can actually make a "relatively safe" situation less safe than it would be without bonding and this condition should always be considered prior to making a final decision
The one main example I am thinking of is someone touching say an appliance that has become Live (Line or Phase) for one or two reasons and everything else within hand reach is "floating" (electrically), bonding or effectively earthing things within reach certainly increases chances of electric shock and therefore electrocution if not an unintended knee jerk sort of reaction which in itself cause harm. I suppose the flip side is that having that faulty appliance at a potential opposite to the faulty appliance potential could also be said to give us more of a chance of becoming aware of it (if we survive).
It seems to be that cases of things being live for quite some time until some chance happening causes us to become touching something earthed or earth like at some time and we might then decide to investigate or report it (or not).
Again it`s the balance of proballities question and interpreting the so called best answer.

 

[trojanhawrs]

A bit of toing and froing on this but for the time being have decided against learning electrics as I don’t feel I have the right mind set currently to do it. I might go back to learning woodwork, but who knows. Vicious cycle atm.

Seems to me you already have a pretty good understanding on a practical level. Have seen you helping people on a lot of threads with thermostat and programmers, you'd be surprised how many electricians struggle with basic control systems.

Most of the rest domestic wise is just knowing what is and isn't acceptable, and in doubt finding out with the book. Frequency, capacitance, inductance etc for the most part is only important to the engineers well above my pay grade