extension lead plug and socket

Gday,,, Your next trip must be getting close...

I would need a 6 metre lead to be outside my yard , :-)

Spot on Cam that what was said, I was envisaging a lead woith two male plugs, which I used to have one of but it was THE MOST DANGEROUS thing I have used, only used it once and then cut the plug off one end.

Here is an interesting quote from a thread on ignoring gas regulations but it applies equally here:-

"Fellas - this one ends up as a personal choice, and you decide what you do.

However - in my experience as technical manager for many years for a major water heater company a long time ago, the people who sit on committees that write standards have access to pretty frightening stats on deaths and fires and stuff. They are given the task of making fatalities equal zero. Nothing about liability, all about safety."

PeterD

Even if a sparky wires up a lead with a 10A male and 15A female plug and there is a fire and the insurance company finds it it will void your policy. It is still illegal if a sparky wires it up.

Bonz this true but a qualified and licensed sparky would not do this for a customer so your point is mute.
It is illegal and dangerous to property and people.

Which of course what I was trying to get across.

PeterD

I'm impressed that you noted my comment on another site as to why regulations are fussy and apparently conservative. Thank you.

In this case, meercat, the solution which is legal and reassuring is to pay a sparky to put a 15 amp plug in the garage. You can plug ordinary leads into it and know that when you plug your 15 amp van lead in it is safe and legal.

While you have the electrician, get him to give the 240 volt wiring on the van a safety check and tag your lead - that will reassure you you are safe and protect you from the odd caravan park that demands that you have tagged leads.

Cheers
Max

Quote: Max "You can plug ordinary leads into it and know that when you plug your 15 amp van lead in it is safe and legal. "

I am not so sure that it is safe to plug anything other than 15 amp into that socket.
A 15 amp point has a much larger breaker (25amp? I think) than a 10 amp (16 amp). If your appliance is faulty and _Affordable_Storage_Drawers.aspx 16+ amps a normal 10 amp circuit will trip. If you use a 15 amp point with a 10 amp appliance, it will not trip and the failure could cause injury to the operator.

I keep my 15 amp point labelled clearly and it sits right next to a 10 amp point. I do not mix them up. Yet I do my own wiring at times and I still see the breaker as an essential part of the circuit. I have had enough hits from faulty units and poor practices to appreciate the safety built into properly designed circuits.

At least with using a 15 amp lead with a reduced earth pin is not really unsafe in as far as it could be working near the breaker trip range and if anything were to consume more than 16 amps, it would trip before a 15 amp circuit would. It would be unsafe the other way around.

As fas as tagging leads are concerned, in most cases they are not the result of a safety check but merely from a visual inspection. Better than nothing but not really insurance. I had my van completely rewired as part of the rebuild (not yet finished) and the first operation was tripping the safety switch. I tracked it down to the insulated cover over the inlet was pinching the wire ever so slightly and creating a short. This was not part of the check process as it was a result of final tightening of the cover during the final build. It was a worry for me as the certificate was signed and the sparky did another check with the same result for him. He doesn't do any checks with the covers on as part of a normal process. Simple trap but I am glad for safety switches etc.

Cheers Cam

Cam - you make two very valid points:

1. I suggested that you can plug 10 amp plug into a 15 amp socket because "I have always known" you could. Can't quote my source and in talking about being on the safe side should not have recommended it.

2. A safety check on the van and lead tagging were in my mind two separate things - it would just be convenient to do both while you paid a sparky to be at the house. I should have separated them. But I do hope that inspection of a lead includes checking that conductors are not crossed end from end, which to mind is the other important thing to do on the outlets & appliances in the van (as well as check the safety switch).

Meercat did the right thing in asking and I think we owe it to him to offer advice to go the strictly legal way.

Cheers
Max

Camoco - You said "As fas as tagging leads are concerned, in most cases they are not the result of a safety check but merely from a visual inspection."

Yes lead checking is a visual check but this does not mean it is not a safety check. When I had mine checked the wiring was visually checked to make sure that the wires were connected to the correct pins. He also ran the lead through his fingers to check for problems. Both these were of a visual or feel nature - no instrumentation was used as the visual type inspection would have picked up any defects that would require checking with instrumentation.

PeterD

Hi Peter,
I probably was just letting the regular guys know that a tagged lead is not enough to be confident of safety.
All leads should be tagged and also should be inspected by us each time we use them as we aren't always the ones using them.

I get the shivers when I think back to the days we used to import cable from China to make wiring looms and leads for the machines we made and sold. In many instances (too many so we stopped the imports) the individual wires in the cables were not properly insulated at the joins in the long continuous runs and sometimes were only just touching. These were not detectable from outside inspection. In rarer but worse cases, there were multiple joins at the same location. At least these were detectable by instant failure to tests but they sometimes made it through the installation process and needed to be dissassembled when found faulty.

Poor quality cable even if new can be dangerous. I now buy the dearer Aussie leads to be safe. How can you expect $1/m cable to be safe everytime? That's what Bunnys and the like sell it for and we buy it thinking it's safe 'cos it's new.

I reckon all tagging inspection should be mechanical as well as visual.

Max, I understood your point in them being different things. Agreed.
Meercat, the theme of the thread seems to be safety first and get the right outlet for your garage and get good leads and ensure you check them. Don't take advice on illegal (unsafe) practices unless you know what you are doing. In which case, be safe.

Got that off my chest now I'm fine.
Cheers and be Safe. Cam

We have a test box at work that is used to test leads as well as other appliances, it tests electrically and visual tests are also carried out, any leads with nicked insulation are cut and re terminated. Electrical problems are rarely visually obvious, I would have thought a tagged lead would have to be tested for electrical safety not mechanical or aesthetic safety after all its an electrical lead not a piece of rope.

If an electrician tags a lead as safe and doesn't do a continuity or megger test of the insulation then I doubt he would have a problem with putting a 10amp male plug on a lead with a 15amp female socket.

In fact I reckon you could probably get the shonk to put a 15amp GPO on a general power circuit (10amp)

As others have said there are plenty of work arounds but if you want peace of mind there is only one safe and legal solution, but it is your van, house and life.

Cheers Glen

Licensed sparky for the last 23 years

From my scant remembrances from Applied Electricity 3 you can have one 15a outlet on a 2.5mm circuit or five?(or more) 10a outlets allowing for diversification of the load.

These days Bonz it is purely measured on maximum demand on the circuit, but the mixing of 15a and 10a gpo's on the one circuit is still not allowed, you can have more 10a gpo's than 5 as it is relative to the circuit protection rating etc.

You could have multiple 15a gpo's dependant upon cable size, circuit length (voltage drop) and protection rating, the latest wiring rules AS/NZS 3000:2000 leaves a lot to be desired as far as definitions it is open to alot of user interpretation unlike the earlier versions.

Cheers Glen.