Thread: Diy

A number of years (about 12) ago I needed to wire up a very large shed at home. With fans 7 banks of flouro's, approx 30 power points, Master switch board etc. It was to cost around $4,500 to have it done by a sparky, and approx $600 to do it myself. So I did it all my self. However before a switch was thrown or the mains were attached to the fuse box I got the sparky to come in and do a full check of the system.

He went over it with a fine tooth comd and found that all was to regulation. He then certified it with the council for me. The cost of this final inspection and certification was from memory around $350. All up cost around $950. All legal and above board.

All I did was basically become the sparkies laborour. I did all the time consuming (expensive) work myself. May have taken a little longer but when you don't have the money and you have a need for a job to be done, you have to find a way to do it.

Illegal? Not sure. But at the time in the midle of almost nowhere it was often the done thing.

Cheers - Neil

Originally Posted by ubeaut

Illegal? Not sure. But at the time in the midle of almost nowhere it was often the done thing.

Cheers - Neil

so long as its verified and inspected by a qualified sparky its all above board.

hopefully the sparky aint a cro-magnon man.....

I'd be interested to know what would happen if it burned down and they traced it to an electrical fault caused by bad wiring. If they found out that any of it was done by you, I reckon the sparky's insurance company would try and wriggle out of it. I suppose they never need to find out who did it.

The thing that gets me is that from the plug and socket you need your ticket but from there on it's open to any fool.

As a radio technician I can work on some very dangerous gear, voltages and currents more than enough to kill, but no license needed.

Makes you wonder why? Also the output of radio gear and laser is invisible.

When I have had work done at home the sparkie doesn't leave a certificate to cover the work, how do you keep track of compliance?

sparkys are supposed to log thier work with the electical authorities, so when the joint burns down they know who approved it.

I had some work done by a sparky (increasing diameter of cabling feeding an aircon) and the power authority sent me a nastygram saying "get this fixed or we'll turn you off - coz it "dont comply mate".... " I contacted the sparky and he came round and fixed it. this was when I learnt that he had logged his work and the power dudes came round to me house and checked the work (at the power box) as part of a random check.....

rather funny really... I got a sparky to do something, it was crapulent work, he logged it anyway and then had to come back to fix his p!ss poor effort!

what a wanka!

Originally Posted by bennylaird

When I have had work done at home the sparkie doesn't leave a certificate to cover the work, how do you keep track of compliance?

That's a good point actually.

My house is a Californian bungalow built in the late '20s. Most of the wiring has been replaced (by a sparkie) since we've owned it but a large part of the light circuit and one power circuit is original.

As far as the light circuit is concerned, they are the original fabric covered wires. :eek:
Now presumably if, heaven forbid, the house burned down due to a fault in the light circuit we'd be covered because the fabric wires were once legal.

Obviously you woudn't get away with fabric covered wires today, (not that you could buy any) but when the house was built they were quite o.k.

It's never been a condition of our insurance that we get the house re-wired even though the insurance company knows that it's a 80 year old house so could quite likely have old wiring in it.

(We're probably going to be doing a bit of an extension this year so I plan on getting the remaining bits of re-wiring done then. )

Originally Posted by craigb

It's never been a condition of our insurance that we get the house re-wired even though the insurance company knows that it's a 80 year old house so could quite likely have old wiring in it.

Check the fine print Craig... just in case. Our current policy had an insane requirement that the wiring be replaced every seven years..... just in case I guess. That is now noted as a deletion! :eek:


P

My sparky told me once that if he did any work above a certain percentage or value he had to make sure the rest of the joint complied as well. Don't know if that's true or not. Might just apply to the metre box.

Originally Posted by bennylaird

When I have had work done at home the sparkie doesn't leave a certificate to cover the work, how do you keep track of compliance?

According to the ads they used to run on TV when they changed the system a sparky is required to issue a certificate of compliance for everything that he does and lodge a copy with the Office of Electrical Safety if it exceeds a certain amount. If you don't receive such certificate you should not pay him but report it to the Office of Electrical Safety instead.

Similarly a plumber must lodge a report for work he does. Last year at the place where I work an Inspector arrived to check some plumbing work that had been done. The Inspector failed the work and made the plumber come back and fix it, including stuff that he had not done, at the plumbers expense. The Inspector considered that the stuff that had not been done was relevant to the work of replacing a HW heater and should have been included in the job.

The inspector told me that on average they check 20% of work done on small shops and houses and each plumber can expect 5 % of their work checked.

Peter.

Originally Posted by Sturdee

According to the ads they used to run on TV when they changed the system a sparky is required to issue a certificate of compliance for everything that he does and lodge a copy with the Office of Electrical Safety if it exceeds a certain amount. If you don't receive such certificate you should not pay him but report it to the Office of Electrical Safety instead.

Similarly a plumber must lodge a report for work he does. Last year at the place where I work an Inspector arrived to check some plumbing work that had been done. The Inspector failed the work and made the plumber come back and fix it, including stuff that he had not done, at the plumbers expense. The Inspector considered that the stuff that had not been done was relevant to the work of replacing a HW heater and should have been included in the job.

The inspector told me that on average they check 20% of work done on small shops and houses and each plumber can expect 5 % of their work checked.

Peter.

Must be a Vic thing Peter. It doesn't happen in Sydney. Although given Zed's post, maybe it does sometimes.

However, if I use a licensed electrician and I have an itemised invoice for the work done, aren't I entitled to believe that that work is up to legal standard?

Otherwise, what's the point of using a licensed electrician? :confused:

Yes Craig, it is a Vic thing as each state has their own particular laws on these things. It always amazes me that in Vic there are a lot less licences required than in NSW to build a house.

Here, in addition to your invoice, you must get the certificate of compliance and keep that for inspection by the electrical supply company. If there has been new work and the certificate is not available the supply company will disconnect your supply untill you can produce such certificate.

This all came about because the privitisation of the SEC and the subsequent increase in unlicensed electrical work that was detected. Thus this certificate is meant to protect us from unlicensed work.

BTW for this additional piece of paper the sparky is entitled to charge you an extra fee.:eek:


Peter.

Got my shed wired up by a sparky probably six months back.
About 2 months back a bloke knocks on the door and wants to inspect the work. He was from the office of electrical safety.

Looks over the job very well (I looked over his shoulder - don't like strangers poking about in my workshop) and says the wiring, mounting etc is actually really good then draws up a list of things that seem quite minor to me (but I guess thats the point, I'm not an electrician - minor may actually be important).

Sparky has to come back, fix all the points on the inspection and issue me a new certificate.

Inspector then comes back and re inspects the work and issues me a certificate of his own.

Inspector says that about 20% of his inspections require rework. Now the items he picked up on my shed were minor but it makes me wonder. I am not a sparky / plumber / builder etc and know when I am out of my depth and call the professionals. However I do expect them to actually be professional and not do dodgy work.

In thinking about this, the issue seems to be who is liable for the work regardless of if the job is done well or not. If I hadn't got the certificate (which I had to ask the sparky for) then I could not have held him responsible for shoddy work and the job would not have been inspected.

By definition if you don't know what to do, then you need a professional but then you don't always know if the job has been done well or not. Compliance certificates don't guarantee that, they just make it clearer who is to blame if it all goes to sh*t.

Cheers,

Isn't it funny then that given the fact that no electrical work can be done without a licence, you are free to walk into any electrical suppliers or hardware and buy everything you need to kill yourself.

Cant do it with gun ammunition anymore. I still remember when you could buy ammo in K mart.