!!! What an amazing piece of weaseling!

So by your reasoning a cable that is miswired in such a way that someone gets killed using it is "not dangerous"?


More weaseling!

1) There are many things that do not use switched mode PSU's.

2) It doesn't take a lot of current to kill someone.


Is there no end to your weaseling. You were the person who first mentioned safety in this thread, then, when it is obvious that you are losing all the arguments you try and perform a volta face and say "safety is nothing whatsoever to do with this thread". Then, in resonse to it being pointed out that you were first to mention safety you claim you never said any such thing. Then you quote the line where you were first to mention safety!

Unbelievable!


There are other electrical items than TV's and Sat receivers.

No, it mentioned safety certification, a completely different thing - at no time have I ever suggested that there were any safety implications in removing the moulded plug, only that it destroys the units certification.

Correction: It's your opinion.

Unless you can provide a reference to some statute or to a piece of case law it's just something that is being vociferously asserted by a completely unqualified (and hardly unbiased) layman.

Read the guarantee conditions, it's not difficult.

Once again an opinion, no facts merely speculation.

Were you or were you not the first person to use the word safety?

It was from your use of the word (irrespective of what other words you associated with it) that lead to the discussions of safety related matters within this thread.

It was only used in proper context, and not on it's own, choosing one word out of a complete sentence and taking it to mean something completely different is a bizzare thing to do?.


The quote is above, and is quite clear in what it says - if people read it wrongly, that's their fault.

You clearly have no idea of how the law works in this country.

Manufacturers can put what they like in warranty conditions but only a court of law can determine whether these are valid.

They can fall foul of, just to mention two examples, The Sale of Goods Act and unfair terms and conditions legislation.

You will notice that all warranties and, indeed, mention of warranties include the text: "This does not addect your statutory rights".

This is because it is a criminal offence to try to lead consumers to believe that any terms that a company would wish to impose can override said consumer's legal rights.

Nigel, when you have dug yourself a hole it's a good idea to stop digging.

You were the first person to mention safety. End of.

So far in this thread you've demonstrated a worrying lack of knowledge of both electrical safety and consumer legislation. Obviously you can't quit whilst you are ahead but you could at least try to avoid getting further behind.

Again, completely meaningless sentence, taking one word entirely out of context.


In your opinion -, I would disagree with you - as you certainly has no knowledge of electrical safety, or electricity at all.

Anyway, feel free to have the last post, I won't respond again - but I suggest you reconsider offering legal advice on the subject, which you are simply guessing at, and giving bad advice isn't a good idea.

All exclusion clauses (even if not called exclusion clauses - provided in practice they in some way restrict liability that alone is sufficient to make them exclusion clauses) are subject to a test of reasonableness.

True not everyone has RCD's some still have fuses in their homes, but we're not talking about everyone here. The danger here is supposedly to Humax workers and one would expect a factory building mains electronic equipment would have work stations equipped with RCD protection.

UK RCD's usually work at a minuscule 30 milliamps (30 thousandth of an amp) so are extremely sensitive. My understanding is they do work unless defective especially as most modern RCD's have earth leakage protection so they monitor both the live wiring and the earth circuits for shorts.


Apart from the fact that the plug sockets are on the ring main and the lights are on the lighting circuit, two completely different circuits each with their own protection in a correctly wired building.


I also agree with Nigel, wiring a plug incorrectly doesn't pose a danger in itself so far as I'm aware. The only only dangers I'm aware of in relation to wiring come from having bare wires hanging out of the plug thus risking electrocution or a fire from a short and from damage to the cable itself. The risk from a damage cable exists independently of the type of plug fitted - you could have a damaged cable with a factory fitted plug on the end.

A cable can be tested in seconds as per the PAT test where they run a leakage detector up the outside of the sheath. I'm presuming this should be routine for all returns.

The correct wiring in a plug can be inspected in seconds by manually inspecting the wiring by undoing the plug casing (unplugged of course), the only additional test I can think of as necessary where a factory plug has been replaced.

There really is no justification for replacing a lead just in case a replacement plug has been wired incorrectly as any competent technician should be able test a lead / plug for safety in less than 5 minutes.

Are you ever going to stop this weaseling?

These are your exact words in post #8

"it's a critical safety component"

You brought the subject up in post #6.

Bob_cat also says a plugless box "must be assumed to be unsafe"

So stop trying to backtrack and weasel. It was you who brought mention of safety to this thread.


Well certainly a better knowledge of electricity than you have to the tenses of the verb 'to have'

Do you want to back up the underlined portion of that?

It was you who were unaware that an incorrectly wired two cre cable could present a clear danger. (And repeated your incorrect assertion over and over again just to make sure we all knew the bounderies of your knowledge).

It was you who seemed unaware that a lot of equipment does still use a transformer.


Erm, You are the one who is making dogmatic statements concerning something about which you have absolutely no qualification to pontificate.

All I'm doing is correctly stating that certain clauses in consumer contracts cannot be taken at face value and have to be tested in a court of law.

At no time have I given anyone any advice other than not to take the word of an unqualified commentator (yourself) as gospel, no matter how dogmatic and vociferous he may be in asserting his opinion.

I did explain earlier how miswiring a two core cable can lead to a lethal electrical configuration.

The example was not academic.

Over the years people have changed 15A sockets to dual 13A and neglected to connect the earth. Also the earth can become disconnected elsewhere in the circuit.

In these circumstances wiring a two core cable between live and earth can present a lethal voltage on the casing of any other earthed equipment sharing the unearthed part of the circuit.

If the case of the remote case was truly earthed then the case voltage to earth will be approx zero (depending on the fault current and the earth loop impedance), there is no risk of electric shock, and the resulting fault current will operate the circuit protection.

That's the whole raison d'etre of providing an earth.

In theory it's possible (but very unlikely as it involves multiple failures) is that the live conductor of a double insulated appliance could get connected to the screen of a connection linking one or more double insulated devices making the cases of all live. Since no fault current flows then this condition is undectable by any overcurrent or earth leakage protection provided. This risk is present in all double insulated appliances, and the changing of the plug has no bearing whatsoever. As far as I am aware no such failure has ever ocurred in a double insulated appliance.

What you say is true but hardly relevant to this case as it's already agrred by all parties that connecting a different plug has no effect on electrical safety even though these dangers might already be present on the supplying cct. THe danger you describe cannot be created (apart from as described above) from any double insulated appliance even though it's connected to a plug with no earth connection (The appliance has no earth connection irrespective of the supply socket)
Last edited by grahamlthompson : 01-04-2009 at 12:18

I think we are talking at cross purposed here. (i.e. you talk about 'truly' earthed but the whole point of my example was that something was not, in fact, earthed, a situation that does occur in real life).


If you look at post #96 you will see that Goodwin states absolutely dogmatically, several times, that no danger can arise from miswiring a two core cable. e.g.: "Not a concern (in this case) because it can't be wired dangerously. There also can't be any voltages to reach other items due to a miswired plug on a two core lead."

Both SWIZZ and myself corrected him on this, SWIZZ even giving him the clue: "think outside the box".

He still continued to maintain that a miswired plug and two core cable could not present a danger until I explicitly showed that it could.

Let me state the exact configuration that causes a lethal voltage to appear on the casing of equipment with an earth lead connected to its (exposed) chassis:

1) Some part of a mains circuit becomes detached from earth (for example because an incompetant amateur has replaced a single socket with a double and left the earth unattached).

2) Someone wires a two core cable between live and earth.

3) Someone plugs this cable into the dual socket into which is already plugged a piece of equipment that has its casing connected to the earth lead which is correctly connected inside the plug.

At this point a potentially lethal voltage is present on the casing of the supposedly earthed case.

Not disagreeing with you in any way, just that this cannot arise from a double insulated appliance however you connect the plug, apart from a virtually impossible combination of circumstances.

Yes, I'm afraid I'm a bit off topic as I'm still responding to Mr. Goodwin's assertion which made no mention of the nature of the appliance connected by the two core cable.

The OFT/Trading standards has just given me the following advice.

Because a manafacturs warranty is not legally required then Humax can put any conditions they like on it.

However this in no way removes or replaces your rights under the sale of goods act, which is contract between yourself and the supplying dealer. A dealer cannot legally refuse to pay the cost of repairing the object unless they can prove that the modification contributed to the failure. Clearly this is not a problem here, so anyone who has purchased a Foxsat-hdr from anyone (including Mr Goodwin) and is refused redress because the mains plug is not original can sue with virtually a 100% certainty of success.

A responce from the MD of a company supplying modified plugs that are designed for easy removal for people with arthritic hands.

We have never had any problems related to this despite selling thousands.

I'm kind of puzzled here as the Humax neither has a 2 core cable or is double insulated.

Plus any mis-wiring of the plug would be spotted on a visual inspection which takes moments - the removal of a single screw holding the cap on the plug. To me this makes this part of the discussion somewhat academic.

All that's needed is for a technician to open the plug on a returned item and ensure its correctly fitted. Its a 30 second job without corrections and a couple of minutes if corrections are needed.

To me its a £5 charge at most although given the consumer has a right to change a plug, I wonder if any charge is actually legally justifiable as such a check actually seems to be a normal part of providing a service. After all its not a customers request for a check but a normal company requirement for ensuring the health and safety of its own employees which is the companies responsibility not the customers.

I'm not sure why you quoted me.

I responded to a dogmatic, unqualified, and incorrect assertion by Nigel Goodwin that it was impossible to miswire a a plug with a two core cable such that it would be dangerous.

That is absolutely untrue.

It was something aside from the Foxsat warranty issue but it seemed worth perusing since he was repeating potentially lethal advice - in one case three times in the same post.

It is true that there needs to be some other fault to make a dangerously miswired lead actually pose a threat but most accidents are a result of a coincidence of more than one fault.

Anyone who has had anything to do with the repair of domestic applances will remember just how badly some mains plugs were fitted by their uses, in the case of washing machines people have been killed because the earth lead within the plug became detached and contacted the live terminal. My personal veiw is that once a molded plug was designed that allowed for a fuse change, members of the public should be advised not to interfer with them, and if it voids the warranty to cut the plug off, dont do it.

Well my humax in common with virtually all AV equipment has only 2 core cable and is therefore double insulated. A quick check with a continuity meter from the case to the plug earth pin will show no path. AV equipment with earthed cases are very rare as it creates hum from induced earth loop currents.

This is a bit off topic, but many high class valve amps have earthed framework, its just normal under such circumstances to to "lift" the signal earths (a 10 ohm resistor is common) to prevent hum. My Creek tuner uses this setup with an earthed case.