Author Topic: armoured cable - help  (Read 5395 times)

Offline therecklessengineer

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #15 on: April 30, 2015, 06:54:57 AM »
You could always add an additional earth spike in the shed as well as using the sheath.

Offline knighty

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #16 on: April 30, 2015, 12:53:41 PM »
you're not supposed to have more than one earth point... with more than one you can get a voltage running between them
(only 1volt etc.. but it's enough to cause corrosion etc..)

Offline Rossey

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #17 on: April 30, 2015, 10:36:18 PM »
Needs to be 2.5mm2

It's is three phase but just mark the ends the right colours then it's just three core.

Offline therecklessengineer

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #18 on: May 01, 2015, 06:38:44 AM »
you're not supposed to have more than one earth point... with more than one you can get a voltage running between them
(only 1volt etc.. but it's enough to cause corrosion etc..)

Oooops. Didn't know that.

Offline julesandtash

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #19 on: May 01, 2015, 09:59:56 AM »
All three core SWA will use the harmonised colours as per the photo. You wont see any with brown, blue and green&yellow cores like you see in normal flex. Before the harmonised colours change it was Red, Yellow and Blue.

You can buy two core but far better to use three core and use one as live, one as neutral and one as earth. You can leave the brown as brown for the live but the other two should be sleeved with the correct colour sleeving as soon as they leave the cable, blue for neutral and green&yellow for the earth. It is not really good practice to use the armour as earth since it is steel, not copper, so has far different electrical characteristics and also the integrity of the earth path then relies upon the mechanical contact between the glads at each end of the cable and the armouring wires.
This is why it is quite common to see a spearate insulated copper earth conductor running alongside three phase SWA cables (where all the cores are in use).
For single phase it is far better to use the third core as earth

Make sure you earth the armour as well though since, as well as providing mechanical protection, it also provides electrical protection if something conductive penetrates the cable and hits the live conductor (like a spade with you holding on to the other end) as that conductive object will also be in contact with the earthed armour and will therefore provide a nice low resistance earth path and trip the protective devices before you get a nasty shock.


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Offline Twenty4Seven

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #20 on: May 01, 2015, 10:58:33 AM »
you're not supposed to have more than one earth point... with more than one you can get a voltage running between them
(only 1volt etc.. but it's enough to cause corrosion etc..)

Could you tie the two together a 'la equipotential bonding?
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Offline knighty

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #21 on: May 01, 2015, 11:51:58 PM »
you're not supposed to have more than one earth point... with more than one you can get a voltage running between them
(only 1volt etc.. but it's enough to cause corrosion etc..)
Could you tie the two together a 'la equipotential bonding?

how do you mean ?

you can have 2 separate earths, as long as they're not joined together

so different earths in different places, all fed from the same live feed is fine
« Last Edit: May 01, 2015, 11:53:46 PM by knighty »

Offline Twenty4Seven

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #22 on: May 02, 2015, 09:58:20 AM »
you're not supposed to have more than one earth point... with more than one you can get a voltage running between them
(only 1volt etc.. but it's enough to cause corrosion etc..)
Could you tie the two together a 'la equipotential bonding?

how do you mean ?

you can have 2 separate earths, as long as they're not joined together

so different earths in different places, all fed from the same live feed is fine

Now I'm confused! In your earlier post you say you're not supposed to have more than one earth point but now you say you can (as long as they're not joined together). I was just thinking back to when I rewired our first house and remembering that I had to tie all the pipework together and connect it to the main earth conductor. That's what I understand as equipotential bonding. Mind, that was a long time ago - I think we were on the 15th edition of the IEE Regs :)
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Offline knighty

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Re: armoured cable - help
« Reply #23 on: May 02, 2015, 10:18:28 AM »
yeah, sorry, wasn't very clean in 1st post (long hours, I'm half asleep)

you can have more than 1 earth as long as they're not joined together

but it's easier to just use the same earth for everything


what length of cable do you need rotary ?