Advice needed pls - Caravan safety body?

[Hutch]

Dom and Dusty, sound like a comedy duo, .
The electrical C and I C, the company used to be Barkers Electrical Contractors, based in Churchill st. In Hull.

 

[Dustydog]

Dom and Dusty, sound like a comedy duo, .
The electrical C and I C, the company used to be Barkers Electrical Contractors, based in Churchill st. In Hull.

Check out a Companies House. Smoke screens etc

 

[ProfJohnL]

Yes, so we come full-circle. My original question was "Who is responsible for enforcing electrical regulations, as laid down by the IEEE, when installed in a caravan?"
The installation in my van is not up to the required standards which, were it a domestic or commercial installation, would be covered by one of either the Building Regulations, HSE or the IEEE....
All a bit of a concundrum really.I have a poor installation, they don't care, and there is seemingly nothing I can do about it.

As the matter falls into the consumer area, Trading standards would be your first port of call. If they take it up (and I do have my doubts about as the caravan is 5 years old) they would if necessary involve the HSE. Inspections would be carried out by an IEEE approved engineer (which you would have to pay for at least initially), and any action would directed to your supplier who is your seller,( not the manufacturer.)
for selling defective goods.

 

[ProfJohnL]

The damage shown on the pictures in my opinion does not support the idea the wires were "shorting". Its more consistent with a high resistance contact causing the contact to heat up.

Other evidence in the pictures also suggests to me the problem was not the wire termination that was the initial problem, but more likely the live contractor in the RCD. The resulting heat has deformed teh RCD's casing well below the level of the wire terminal.

Clearly there has been a lot of heat which will have conducted back to the terminal and the incoming conductor. and I suspect it may have been enough due to differential expansions of copper and brass to expand the soft copper conductors which will have distorted under the clamping force, but when cooled the copper will retain its new shape but be smaller than before giving the impression it may not have been fully tightened in the first instance. The distribution of the discolouration of copper conductors also points to an heat source other than a problem at the clamping point

It is also possible the system has been run at its full current for some time, which would have exacerbated any high resistance contact problems. But of course it should be capable of managing its rated current virtually indefinitely.

In my view it points to an RCD becoming faulty, rather than necessarily poor connection work on the part of the installer.

It is in my view all but impossible to conclusively show the device was faulty at the time of installation, and thus contrary to your statutory rights under SoGA.

You would need to obtain a written report by an approved IEEE electrical installation engineer who was prepared to state the installation fails to meet the appropriate regulations at the point of sale.

As a more general comment, as the age of an installation increases, and especially one that is subject to vibrations through being towed, the probability that some items will begin to fail increases. There is also the possibility that someone may have operated the equipment in a way it was not designed to be used, and consequently the chances of being able to get a remedy through your statutory rights is very very small. As as I have also suggested it would be very difficult to prove the original installation was technically inadequate and not fit for purpose.

I suspect this is one of those incidents that has to be put down to experience.

 

[dsolds]

Agree with most of the above. In my opinion, and speaking as an Electronics Engineer, the failure has been caused by arcing where the cable is screwed in, not the live contactor. Having now opened up the unit the actual contacts are fine with very little evidence of heat build up. Thus a loose securing screw in the contact is the likely culprit.
This again comes back to what I was saying initially, and as you point out, the caravan is now over 5 years old so it is likely the contact worked loose with vibration. I have owned the caravan from new so I positively know nothing has been abused, we can rule that out. I can't ever recall even having tripped the pole breaker actually.
But, coming back to my OP, in the same way that a domestic or commercial installation has to be serviced/inspected at certain intervals (OK, domestic ones are rarely, if ever, inspected) there necessarily must be some kind of schedule to perform an inspection where loose connections would be identified. Coachman refuse to publish this and simply defer to BCA (who make the board).
Furthermore, unless one is willing to strip out the offside bunk it is impossible to remove the consumer unit cover thus making inspection impossible. This is my second point which, again, Coachman won't be drawn on.
I get that components fail sometimes, this in't my point. Although the scary part is that the RCD unit still passes current. Even on a test bed it doesn't trip even if the neutral is fed back through a different circuit so the RCD part is very clearly defective. If there is any differential in current flow between live and neutral it should trip. The TEST button still works strangely but a proper RCD tester says it's faulty. Go figure.
Anyway, going back to my OP, 3 things.
1. Installation is untidy and 2 qualified electricians agree it would not meet the required regulations for a fixed installation. Since all Coachman 620/4 models (and probably others too) have this mess one can only conclude that Coachman are shipping out non-compliant units.
2. Installation does not provide for periodic inspection and is thus non-compliant.
3. The components used (NBSe breakers) "may" have an issue. Since mine failed to trip I was trying to highlight this to Coachman. This was never about the damned compensation culture we have these days, it was about bringing up a safety matter. Since neither Coachman or BCA are remotely interested you can draw your own conclusions from this. To be clear, I am not after compensation, I simply felt Coachman ought to notify their dealers about this. Maybe I'm deluded expecting them to do the right thing, after all it won't generate profit for them.
To answer a couple of questions further up the thread, Van was on a site, plugged into their pole which did not have individual 16a breakers for each socket. The van is rarely, if ever, run at the full 16 amps. We use gas for heating, 12v for TV and the only mains items are the fridge, a 1.5kw kettle and various phone chargers, oh and a crappy low power toaster which takes 5 minutes to cook 2 slices, so we tend to use the gas grill.
As for the installation now, NBSe RCD unit now replaced with a Hager unit (German) - pre-tested on a RCD tester, incoming cable from caravan inlet socket to mains RCD - I replaced the 2.5mm cable with 4mm to get a bit more bulk in the screw terminals, and routed it properly. Ends correctly crimped with ferrules to alleviate screws backing out with vibration. Front bunk modified so I can now get the cover off for periodic inspection.
Oh, and a large note; never another penny going to Coachman. They've had their last out of me. For a supposed "Premium" product it's pretty junk under the covers and their customer service is about the worst I've ever encountered. God knows what I'll buy next time but it definitely won't be a Coachman, that's for sure.

 

[otherclive]

Agree with most of the above. In my opinion, and speaking as an Electronics Engineer, the failure has been caused by arcing where the cable is screwed in, not the live contactor. Having now opened up the unit the actual contacts are fine with very little evidence of heat build up. Thus a loose securing screw in the contact is the likely culprit.
This again comes back to what I was saying initially, and as you point out, the caravan is now over 5 years old so it is likely the contact worked loose with vibration. I have owned the caravan from new so I positively know nothing has been abused, we can rule that out. I can't ever recall even having tripped the pole breaker actually.
But, coming back to my OP, in the same way that a domestic or commercial installation has to be serviced/inspected at certain intervals (OK, domestic ones are rarely, if ever, inspected) there necessarily must be some kind of schedule to perform an inspection where loose connections would be identified. Coachman refuse to publish this and simply defer to BCA (who make the board).
Furthermore, unless one is willing to strip out the offside bunk it is impossible to remove the consumer unit cover thus making inspection impossible. This is my second point which, again, Coachman won't be drawn on.
I get that components fail sometimes, this in't my point. Although the scary part is that the RCD unit still passes current. Even on a test bed it doesn't trip even if the neutral is fed back through a different circuit so the RCD part is very clearly defective. If there is any differential in current flow between live and neutral it should trip. The TEST button still works strangely but a proper RCD tester says it's faulty. Go figure.
Anyway, going back to my OP, 3 things.
1. Installation is untidy and 2 qualified electricians agree it would not meet the required regulations for a fixed installation. Since all Coachman 620/4 models (and probably others too) have this mess one can only conclude that Coachman are shipping out non-compliant units.
2. Installation does not provide for periodic inspection and is thus non-compliant.
3. The components used (NBSe breakers) "may" have an issue. Since mine failed to trip I was trying to highlight this to Coachman. This was never about the damned compensation culture we have these days, it was about bringing up a safety matter. Since neither Coachman or BCA are remotely interested you can draw your own conclusions from this. To be clear, I am not after compensation, I simply felt Coachman ought to notify their dealers about this. Maybe I'm deluded expecting them to do the right thing, after all it won't generate profit for them.
To answer a couple of questions further up the thread, Van was on a site, plugged into their pole which did not have individual 16a breakers for each socket. The van is rarely, if ever, run at the full 16 amps. We use gas for heating, 12v for TV and the only mains items are the fridge, a 1.5kw kettle and various phone chargers, oh and a crappy low power toaster which takes 5 minutes to cook 2 slices, so we tend to use the gas grill.
As for the installation now, NBSe RCD unit now replaced with a Hager unit (German) - pre-tested on a RCD tester, incoming cable from caravan inlet socket to mains RCD - I replaced the 2.5mm cable with 4mm to get a bit more bulk in the screw terminals, and routed it properly. Ends correctly crimped with ferrules to alleviate screws backing out with vibration. Front bunk modified so I can now get the cover off for periodic inspection.
Oh, and a large note; never another penny going to Coachman. They've had their last out of me. For a supposed "Premium" product it's pretty junk under the covers and their customer service is about the worst I've ever encountered. God knows what I'll buy next time but it definitely won't be a Coachman, that's for sure.

Thanks for the detailed update and you seem to have installed a better replacement unit, with modifications that should allow easier inspection. Whilst Coachman do seem to trend on their quality, I am not sure sure that it is a measurable improvement over others. Cracked panels, missing/non fitted weight plates, dismissive Service Agent replies don't seem to me to be a good sign. As you have a German charging unit, why not go the whole hog and have a Knaus Starclass next time. Prices not dissimilar to UK vans, doors on our side, and customisable MTPLM for a decent payload if required.

 

[dsolds]

Research on German built caravans is on my list. Will probably keep this one until No.1 Son no longer wants to come with us, then a new one is on the cards. 2 or 3 years at a guess.

 

[Gafferbill]

To answer a couple of questions further up the thread, Van was on a site, plugged into their pole which did not have individual 16a breakers for each socket.

..................... hmy: hmy:

 

[Gafferbill]

IMO care should be taken when connecting a caravan to an electrical supply and where that supply is on a campsite that is a business charging customers, then rules and regulations have to be adhered to.
Most caravans have the requirement that they should only be connected to a supply that meets the standards of BS761.
The supply equipment appears to be inadequate in the OP's case......arcing in a supply cable within the caravan was promoted as the likely cause and this should have tripped the supply at the pitch post.
Caravans are complicated beasts and can develop faults from new let alone at 5 years old .......secondary backup safety devices are very important.

General reading of what to expect from a campsite pitch socket......see here

A quote from the requirements.............

Caravan pitch socket outlets

Caravan pitch socket outlets are required to comply with BS EN 603092 and must have a
degree of protection of at least IP44. The current rating is to be not less than 16 A but may be greater if required.
At least one socket outlet should be provided for each caravan pitch.
Where socket outlets are grouped in pitch supply equipment, there should be one socket
outlet for each pitch limited to a group of four. To be compatible with the caravan connecting
cable, socket outlets should be two pole with the earthing contact having key position 6 h.
Each socket outlet must be protected individually by an overcurrent device, which may be a fuse but is more usually a circuit breaker, and individually by an RCD having the characteristics specified in Regulation 415.1.1 for additional protection.
The RCD must disconnect all live conductors including the neutral.