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[theoperaghost]

My appartment (in France) has only one socket with an earth...!
Let me explain in more detail..

I have just bought an appartment in Lourdes (France) The appartment is everything I expected, but there is a slight problem..

Only one socket in the appartment has an earth wire, it is in the bedroom, I want to be able to use appliances that require an earth terminal (Fridge/Kettle/Iron/Toaster) but it is not realistic to use them in the bedroom!

A neighbour said he got round the problem by running a wire from the waterpipe in the kitchen to the two nearest sockets (His dad did it for Him) but is this safe??

I have looked and there is a yellow and green wire from the copper water pipes to the two sockets.

I hope someone can help and sorry if this reflects something already posted before, I did look first.

Thanks et Merci.

Danny

The Opera Ghost

[333rocky333]

Dont know about france , but here you could not use the water pipe, in a fault you may liven up all the pipework etc, possible you may just need a proper earth rod installed and tested,but I would check with someone qualified on french regs.
WE do bond pipework here but only to keep it at same voltage potential as earth, but this is in addition to the main electric supply earth being adequate, whether it by cable or earth rod.

[theoperaghost]

The appartment is on the (7th) top floor, there is an earth in the bedroom socket, and one in the bedroom light fitting, can one of these be extended to an near by socket? I have some 4mm (5 core) earth wire.. is this any good?

Thanks again.

Danny

[333rocky333]

I see an earth rod is a bit of a problem then,do you know if there is an earthing terminal or bar,where the main fuse supply enters the building.

Any bonds would be better going to that temporary, rather than a water pipe or having none at the sockets.

Not sure about france but our earths would be run with or within in the cable for each circuit, and its not acceptable to use an earth from another circuit, when inside this cable the earth core is never larger than the live cores ,so you may need some wiring done to conform.

Are you sure there is no earth, in some countries, sometimes sockets look two pin but have a metal earth tag which connects to the plug when inserted.

I would get someone qualified in france ,as if your freind has used water pipe ,it may possibly be ok to do this in france, or he may be putting the whole block at risk.

[theoperaghost]

I have removed the socket from the wall and there are only two wires inside... (one red and one black)

In the Bedroom, both sockets have an earth.

Hope this helps.

Danny

[333rocky333]

After enqiries your two core wiring is quite common in france in older instalations.

However it apparently does NOT conform to latest regs.

EDF are french so they do your supply , although they do not supply an earth as in uk and the supply earth is consumers responsibility.
And must be installed.

The french then tend to use a form of rcd at the supply and the french do not use ring circuits or use bare earth cable ,like our,T+E as the earth has to be insulated.

Would highly recomend you and your neighbour, gets it checked for your own safety.

[333rocky333]

can you tell where the earth wires from bedroom go back to,to establish whether you have a supply earth.

Can you see green/yellow wires in the location of the supply.

Have you established the earth is suitable in the bedroom,as although the earthcore is present it possibly may not go back to the source.
As france use radial circuits someone may have just extended to the second socket using three core earthed cable from an existing twin wired unearthed socket ,there would then be one earth wire present in each but not functioning

[ban-all-sheds]

As rocky says - get a French electrician in to have a look.

Bientôt!!

[theoperaghost]

French electrician did the job for 50 euros

Thanks all