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The silly season has started. - sainsbury's christmas ad sparks complaints.
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<blockquote data-quote="jeallen01" data-source="post: 1063173" data-attributes="member: 176704"><p>[USER=186250]@Topper[/USER]</p><p>Ref RCD in European domestic situations - whilst they do provide a lot of protection, they are fairly "coarse" protection at 30mA nominal and can take a finite time to trip. OTOH, the N.American version ("GFCI") has a much lower (5mA) rating and would probably "work quicker" but also be a lot more sensitive to spikes on the lines.</p><p></p><p>Anyway,</p><p>- they are there as a backstop if someone does something really stupid, and people should not be lulled into thinking that everything will always be "OK"!</p><p>- more importantly, they are designed to trip if the fault current path is Line->Ground,<u> but NOT if it is <strong>Line->Neutra</strong></u><strong>l</strong>, and so if somehow a kid got his two hands to bridge Line to Neutral (possible, but I grant unlikely !) then an RCD would NOT trip!</p><p></p><p>Edited: PS: same thing as if you cut through the power cord of a Double-insulated lawnmower or hedgetrimmer (etc.) on a dry day - the over-current breaker in the Line (and/or the fuse in the plug) does trip but the RCD does <u>NOT</u> because the short is Line->Neutral and not Line->Ground</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="jeallen01, post: 1063173, member: 176704"] [USER=186250]@Topper[/USER] Ref RCD in European domestic situations - whilst they do provide a lot of protection, they are fairly "coarse" protection at 30mA nominal and can take a finite time to trip. OTOH, the N.American version ("GFCI") has a much lower (5mA) rating and would probably "work quicker" but also be a lot more sensitive to spikes on the lines. Anyway, - they are there as a backstop if someone does something really stupid, and people should not be lulled into thinking that everything will always be "OK"! - more importantly, they are designed to trip if the fault current path is Line->Ground,[U] but NOT if it is [B]Line->Neutra[/B][/U][B]l[/B], and so if somehow a kid got his two hands to bridge Line to Neutral (possible, but I grant unlikely !) then an RCD would NOT trip! Edited: PS: same thing as if you cut through the power cord of a Double-insulated lawnmower or hedgetrimmer (etc.) on a dry day - the over-current breaker in the Line (and/or the fuse in the plug) does trip but the RCD does [U]NOT[/U] because the short is Line->Neutral and not Line->Ground [/QUOTE]
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The silly season has started. - sainsbury's christmas ad sparks complaints.
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