The mystery Box needs fixing!

[PHOnly]

Hello dear viewer!

I come to this part of the forum to hopefully get some advice or basic knowledge.
In all honesty I have pretty much not a clue about anything at this point, but obviously need to start somewhere with doing home improvements.

I am very doubt full I will do things on my own, but without any knowledge it is rather difficult to even remotely asses who you should hire or approach a problem. I also realized recently I have quite the blind spot when it comes to handy stuff and need to fix that at least a little bit.

I am uploading pictures of the fuse box for you guys to have a general look and I am hoping for some feedback, advice, information in regards to (and anything else, cause honesty I do not even know what I should ask):

The current issues are the following:

Some parts of the house the electricity doesnt work any more (well duhh, some of the fuses are turned off) - Bathroom (ground floor) has light but the contacts where our heater was connected to is not working any more and the other contacts in the bathroom neither - Kids have no light in their room, contacts in their room work though.
The fuses as seen in the picture, which are turned off right now can not be turned on. They either directly popp out again, or lead to a take out of all other fuses as well (I think, but maybe its just the main fuses - is it relevant information?)


Anything on first sight looking weird?

https://imgur.com/a/l4tPW7y

#4 The grey cable seems to be where the electricity is coming in. and ends up going from top inside the first fuse (see #5)
#5 Is that the main electricity coming in? Those cable look thin as heck?
#7 The big red cables "move" electricity from the bottom first fuse to the top part of the second fuse? Why are there seemingly two same fuses next to each other? Is there a functionality reason for it?
#6 What are those cables? Is it like a grounding thing or something? What exactly does that even mean?
#3 So we got some serious red cables again! But it seems a bit weird, that it seems that the electricity comes in from the top (#8) and goes out on the bottom? So really thin cables to really thick cables? That seems weird.
#1 and #2 are the fuses who keep being knocked out and I can not put them back into "on". Is it possible that the "fuse" is broken and simply needs replacing (I remember from 35 years ago when we had those old school fuses which needed to have a part replaced, when they blew)?

Also what is the yellow looking box thing above the fuse box?

Do I assume correctly that the electricity flows somewhere behind the fuses? Meaning it goes through the fuse to either blue/brown, and then circles back into the fuse through brown/blue?

Ah, and the red cables are connected to the big boy conductor on the bottom to the big boy conductor on the top? And the two fuses in the beginning #7 safeguards the incoming electricity and then guards the electro-city going to the conductor in the back of the bottom row?

Like I said I have no clue - please share knowledge, ask question, feedback or whatever. I am super green and for any progress on knowledge very ... its appreciated and I am excited on the progress already made, haha

-P

 

[blup]

What part of the UK are you in?

 

[Why Not Indeed]

No point posting Imgur links, they block access from the UK.
Ask the mods to move your post here: https://www.diynot.com/diy/forums/electrics-abroad/

 

[Ragnar_AT]

OP seems to be located in Belgium. #5 and #7 are called RCDs, they trip if there‘s current leaking to earth. Depending on where you are in Belgium they‘re called differentiel or aardlekschakelar. The one on the right trips at 300 mA of leakage, the one on the left at 30. You spotted correctly that they‘re wired in series, it’s a fail-safe design. The 30 mA is there to protect people from electric shock but if that fails there‘s at least the 300 mA to keep your house from catching fire.

You probably need an electrician to get this sorted and it‘ll probably involve opening junction boxes to disconnect wires and figure out what goes where.

 

[PHOnly]

Thank you everyone for their answers.
Yes, I live in Belgium.
Didn't know about imgur being blocked in the UK - when I tried uploading images I think it was a size issue, so went the easy way.

Does anybody know on how to see if the fuses are dead, or something else went wrong with #1 and #2 not being able to turn back on?

Fully aware I will most likely need an electrician at one point to sort it out, but sadly my experience with handy man is overall not a positive one. Especially not very trusting to the electricians I met so far (or who did work for me). So I am trying to gather as much information as possible beforehand so I can make better educated guesses.

 

[PHOnly]

OP seems to be located in Belgium. #5 and #7 are called RCDs, they trip if there‘s current leaking to earth. Depending on where you are in Belgium they‘re called differentiel or aardlekschakelar. The one on the right trips at 300 mA of leakage, the one on the left at 30. You spotted correctly that they‘re wired in series, it’s a fail-safe design. The 30 mA is there to protect people from electric shock but if that fails there‘s at least the 300 mA to keep your house from catching fire.

You probably need an electrician to get this sorted and it‘ll probably involve opening junction boxes to disconnect wires and figure out what goes where.

THank you! Learned something here What would be your suggestion on how to get an idea if the fuse is broken or something went sideways in the circuit?
I read somehwere else, that removing the live (brown wire) and the check if the fuse stays in on without current in it would be an option. Secondly if the fuse is still healthy but the fault is indeed somewhere else, I think I read that opening and checking contact points to see if everything is ok, but.... what are the chances that one of the contacts failed?

I am rather a bit concerned and imagining that one of the wires burned out in a wall, and they will have to open half the bathroom to fix stuff haha.

(I mean obviously you dont know, I am just looking for experience and anekdotes to get a feeling for stuff)

 

[foxhole]

Try correct forum .

 

[Ragnar_AT]

I suppose you could indeed disconnect the brown wire but I'd turn off one of the RCDs (doesn't matter which one) before doing it to be safe. Then turn the RCD back on and try turning the circuit breaker back on. I really don't expect this to help though, much more likely to be a wiring issue than a defective MCB.
The two circuits don't seem related at a first glance. Did they fail at the same time?

I wonder if both circuits pass through the same junction box and a fault on one circuit caused a fault on the other (like a melted connector that damaged the wires of the other circuit). Are there any round or rectangular junction box covers in the bathroom or anywhere near the bathroom, probably somewhere below the ceiling?

One thing I forgot to mention in my first post: yes, the red wires are much bigger than the incoming mains. The most likely reason is that your fuse board came pre-built using wires for the maximum supply size (probably 40 A) but was connected to a much smaller supply in your house.

 

[flameport]

when I tried uploading images I think it was a size issue, so went the easy way.

Reduce the size of the images.

No one wants to go to some external site loaded with adverts and malware just to look at an image, assuming that external site did actually work, which in this case it doesn't.
Even those which do work are infamous for deleting images or blocking access to them after a short time which makes any discussion and answers entirely meaningless.