So what happened in Blackburn?

[JohnW2]

well they all have PCB's with sensative electronics on them...

Sure, but tell me what modern domestic electric appliance doesn't. That was my point/question - is there anything about the electronics systems of boilers which makes them more suspectible than the electronics in washing machines, microwaves, even toasters in some cases etc. etc. etc.?

Kind Regards, John.

 

[bhm1712]

sounds very nice and caring, disconnecting old granny who lives in 1901 terrace house because you 'suspect' there may be pre PVC cables, but you cant access it because shes visiting relatives!

Poor woman will freeze to death when she gets back home to find no electricity.

John: i dont think anything makes them more likely to receive damage, if you read into this fault, almost every item you can think of has been damaged - from boilers, sky boxes to ovens etc i think however, most articles have chosen boilers to speak about because expensive boilers are a hot topic at the moment, what with heating bills going up etc, and boilers costing so much compared to most other appliances

 

[xr4x4]

well they all have PCB's with sensative electronics on them...

Sure, but tell me what modern domestic electric appliance doesn't. That was my point/question - is there anything about the electronics systems of boilers which makes them more suspectible than the electronics in washing machines, microwaves, even toasters in some cases etc. etc. etc.?

Kind Regards, John.

I think it just might be down to the time of year. No heating and hot water should be most people's no 1 priority!

 

[JohnW2]

well they all have PCB's with sensative electronics on them...

And what doesn't these days.. I think was his point.

I dont think it was his point....

That was, indeed, my very point.

If his point was indeed that boilers are indeed no different than anything else, because everything has sensitive electronics, why would he then think that they are lower down on the list of things which were most likely to be damaged?

I probably didn't express that very well (correctly!). What I meant is that I would not have had any reason to think that boilers would have any more suspectible electronic control systems than anything else - so I would have lumped all such devices together in terms of susceptibility, rather than think that any one type of appliance was, per se, any more susceptible than any other.

Kind Regards, John.

 

[JohnW2]

John: i dont think anything makes them more likely to receive damage, if you read into this fault, almost every item you can think of has been damaged - from boilers, sky boxes to ovens etc i think however, most articles have chosen boilers to speak about because expensive boilers are a hot topic at the moment, what with heating bills going up etc, and boilers costing so much compared to most other appliances

Yes, that's probably true. That's why I asked, of the specific linked article (which was all I'd read - I've seen no reporting of this incident 'down south'):

Is this misleading reporting, or is there something about modern boilers which makes them particularly susceptible to such damage?

Kind Regards, John.

 

[JohnW2]

I think it just might be down to the time of year. No heating and hot water should be most people's no 1 priority!

That also makes sense.

Kind Regards, John.

 

[ricicle]

Also a proportion of people will turn off their tvs, toasters, washing machines when not in use but boilers will be left connected to the mains at all times....

 

[westie101]

sounds very nice and caring, disconnecting old granny who lives in 1901 terrace house because you 'suspect' there may be pre PVC cables, but you cant access it because shes visiting relatives!

Poor woman will freeze to death when she gets back home to find no electricity.

Or leave another few hundred without supply while we all wait for her to get back!
We CANNOT reconnect supplies until we check the wiring!!

I've seen us spend a long time trying to get access and the disconnection is a last resort.

So WHAT would you do??

 

[JohnW2]

Also a proportion of people will turn off their tvs, toasters, washing machines when not in use but boilers will be left connected to the mains at all times....

Thatr's a very good point.

Kind Regards, John.

 

[mattylad]

Westie, how to you disconnect someone who you cannot access then?

Unless they have a meter box outside, which is not going to be the case for the terraced houses in Blackburn, do you dig the road/path up?

 

[westie101]

do you dig the road/path up?

If that is the only way - yes. If If recall in Westhoughton out of quite a few hundred it ended up with about 10 disconnected outside.

 

[crystal ball]

In the majority of cases all that is actually damaged is part of the power supply of the equipment. There is a company goes round and usually repairs most of the stuff. Of course that takes time if a lot of houses are affected which in this "fix it now" world causes complaint.
Also if there is any suspicion of pre-PVC wiring we have to carry out an inspection of these properties.

Any we can't access are disconnected in the street

How do you suspect pre PVC wiring without access, and if it is PVC it may not be safe, do you do a full PIR on every property

 

[westie101]

We suspect non PVC wiring by the age of the property, anything built since the 1970s is assumed to have PVC

Next time you look at a piece of PVC T&E look at the voltage it is rated for, in the worst case voltage will not exceed this, similarly for accessories (not a guess lots of national testing and confirmation with manufacturers, also about 40 years experience of this sort of fault nationally).

Older wiring is not to these specs.
Yes we will do a full PIR to confirm the state of the wiring. At one time we used to do all properties but never found any faults on PVC systems. (though we found very few on older wiring)

 

[SimonH2]

well they all have PCB's with sensative electronics on them...

Sure, but tell me what modern domestic electric appliance doesn't. That was my point/question - is there anything about the electronics systems of boilers which makes them more suspectible than the electronics in washing machines, microwaves, even toasters in some cases etc. etc. etc.?

I saw they did play quite heavily on the "no telly, 3 kids, WTF do I do now ?" angle.

But I think the issue is that we can live without a telly, etc, but living with no hot water or heating is quite uncomfortable - and for some life threatening. It does reinforce my view that combi boilers are the work of the devil since they fail, and when the fail you are stuffed with no backup for hot water or heating. At least if you have a "traditional" hot water cylinder you can turn on the immersion heater - it should still be working since a) it will have been turned off if you have a boiler, and b) if it was turned on, it's most likely to have tripped the breaker/blown the fuse.

And on this, there was something I suspect few people have ever considered - a gas cut - a few weeks ago. The news then also focussed on the "how do we live without hot water ?" angle. The gas cut was caused by water in the main - caused by a burst water main and the high pressure water cutting it's way into the gas main

 

[westie101]

And on this, there was something I suspect few people have ever considered - a gas cut - a few weeks ago. The news then also focussed on the "how do we live without hot water ?" angle. The gas cut was caused by water in the main - caused by a burst water main and the high pressure water cutting it's way into the gas main

The last time that happened round here, the gas board gave everyone 2 x 2kW fan heaters each, it was cold so they switched them on (and possibly bought themselves some extra) the 500kVA transformer feeding the area lasted 245 hrs before it failed thus disconnecting all the electricity!

Some interesting discussions with the Gas Board then followed