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From today ( Tuesday ) and every Tuesday for the next 10 weeks I will be posting on my electricians blog my findings in my day to day job as an electrician. After the 10 weeks I will place an opinion poll on my website http://www.mylocalelectrician.co.uk/ where you can give your opinion by voting on what you think is the worst electrical problem I have found!The picture I took above is a piece of 2.5mm twin and earth cable that was installed to feed an electric shower, The shower was a 9.5kw! It is clear why the cable had burned, and thankfully the rcd tripped before this got any worse! A 2.5mm twin and earth cable is rated at 24 amps, this is of course not taking into account volt drop because of the length of run, nor where the cable runs, which of course makes a difference too. This means at 230 volts a 24amp rated cable will take 5520watts (5.5kw) maximum, and should not be rated with more than a 16amp or 20 amp mcb at the fuse box / consumer unit. This is to ensure that the cable does not reach its maximum load, i.e. the picture above! If you have an electric shower please make sure that the cable feeding it is large enough to cope, I am sure you do not want any cables in your home like the one in the picture I took!
