Electrical dangers in the Philippines

[Jollygoodfellow]

3 hours ago, jimeve said:

Not many outlets have Earths, in fact only earthed power is in the shower heater.   

You would want to check what its earthed to. Might be a plastic pipe. 

[GeoffH]

Just now, Jollygoodfellow said:

You would want to check what its earthed to. Might be a plastic pipe. 

 

Or earthed to a copper pipe, that further down the pipe has a plastic section.

[Gary D]

So not many of us know how these crucial safety devices work then.

[Dave Hounddriver]

1 hour ago, Gary D said:

So not many of us know how these crucial safety devices work then.

The top building engineer (Joseph) at the best building contractor (Tierra Alta) in Dumaguete was putting electrical wiring in my friend's house and I was watching.  It was not my business but I had to open my mouth and say:  "Joseph, why are you putting in 2 prong outlets on a new, high end house?  Doesn't the building code call for 3 prong outlets with one of them being a ground?"  He said;  (Direct quote)  "Yes but we cannot do that because Noreco II does not supply a ground for us to attach it to."  My friend was standing there and did not open his mouth so I shut mine.

This is Philippines, it's how its done here.

For anyone who does not "get it", the power company does not supply your ground.  Your ground is a 5/8 inch copper rod power hammered at least 8 feet into the ground to which you will run a wire from your main breaker box and also from your lightning rod (which they also do not use here).

[Arizona Kid]

21 hours ago, Guy F. said:

My condolences to you and yours. Only the good die young?

P139 is too cheap- makes me suspicious. Outlet strips with surge protection are the equivalent of P500 at Walmart in the US.

And most likely made in China. The same ones I buy here. Walmart has to hike the price to gouge the public.

[bastonjock]

I haven't had the time to check out what's available here in the Philippines 

But at an educated guess ( fully qualified electrician here ) I will be changing all of the sockets in my house to the three pronged type , and I will run in three cables to each socket and light fitting ,one being a cpc or an earth wire in lay mans terms,I'll have to check out the type of dist boards but I'll be looking to install RCBO type trips on all mains circuits and perhaps lighting 

I'll run a minimum of a 16 mm earth wire to three earth rods, dig and fitted into the ground ,it might pee off the power company if I ran a center tap earth back to the transformer 

If I can find the gear I'll do an earth loop impedance test 

I refuse to have an electric shower until I have done this kind of stuff

I've been digging into the reeses of my brain to try and think of a way to make this two wire stuff safe ,I can't think of a way that gives fault protection, even the trip switches that I've seen are over rated and dangerous 

[GeoffH]

38 minutes ago, bastonjock said:

I'll run a minimum of a 16 mm earth wire to three earth rods, dig and fitted into the ground

 

Multiple earth rods could cause ground loops if they're at different potentials?

 

Standard procedure in Australia is a single earth rod with circuit breakers on each circuit.

 

Edited December 7, 2018 by GeoffH

[bastonjock]

5 hours ago, GeoffH said:

 

Multiple earth rods could cause ground loops if they're at different potentials?

 

Standard procedure in Australia is a single earth rod with circuit breakers on each circuit.

 

Same here in the UK with separate breakers for each circuit 

As for earth rods,they are as rare as rocking horse poo in the UK, all I can remember about them is that you use a minimum of three  measure the potential between each rod and use the lowest ,they are very rare in the UK as we tend to use the armour sheathing or run an independent earth ,so my intention is to read the book and revise on earth rods 

[Guy F.]

7 hours ago, Arizona Kid said:

And most likely made in China. The same ones I buy here. Walmart has to hike the price to gouge the public.

Or the ones sold in the Philippines could be made with an inferior design and/or materials that would be substandard in the US.

The first Santo Nino shrine my wife brought to the US had an inferior plug- thin cheap metal prongs. It also had a small light bulb screwed into a ceramic fixture with uninsulated screws holding the electrical wires carrying 110 volts! My daughter who was 3 years old at that time draped a gold chain around the light bulb which touched the screws, melting part of the chain. She came very close to getting a nasty shock or worse. Since then when in the Philippines I have noticed everything from Christmas lights to toasters made with clearly inferior electrical components- thinner wire and inferior plug-ins being among the most obvious complaints.

Edited December 7, 2018 by Guy F.

[Jollygoodfellow]

2 hours ago, bastonjock said:

As for earth rods,they are as rare as rocking horse poo in the UK,

From memory in Australia most earths are just connected to water pipes. Things may have changed but I really dont think there is any special rods in a house construction.  There was a girl recently electrocuted and that came from turning off a dripping tap. She is now brain damaged and will need care all of her life so only half saved her, poor kid.