Central heating system not earthed

[tootyfruitypickle]

After a long, painful 18 months of selling and buying, I finally exchanged and completed on my purchase a couple of weeks ago.

I've since put in GCH , and today had an electrician check the property. He found one major fault (made it safe), a few other issues and recommends putting in a new fuse box which will fix them. He also issued a C1 danger notice because the new boiler system is not earthed.

I've asked the CH installers - they say it's an electrician's job. I've asked gas safe, and they say it's an electrician's job but that the engineers should have told me about it. The electrician can't get back now until after my move in date next week, and says that it would be much safer if i can delay my move in until he has done the work. It might mean living there for a week before the work is done.

I'm guessing this is a no brainer but before I undo all the arrangement's I've made (not just movers, but moving internet, other tradespeople booked for soon after I'm in) - is this risk being over egged or should I definitely delay?

I have a vague memory of electricians telling me that my last property wasn't earthed, and ex shrugging and say he didn't think it was an issue... But I am a worrier and have a dd. So thinking I probably need to bite the bullet and shift everything?

thanks for any thoughts !

I wouldn't delay I'd be happy to wait till he gets back but if you can't sleep over it then maybe delay but it wouldn't bother me for a week.

Jesus, I had this, but I was living in the house, my daughter was little, new bathroom installed and they said rhe house wasn't earthed. I needed to call the electricity company responsible for the power..

Thepower company sent out engineers, first thing in the morning,i lived on a busy A road. They cut the power and said the house was dangerous. There was no earth into it. Needed to wait for the road crew.

Up until the wee small hours, phoning constantly. In the dark with candles, freezing.. They were actually going to shut down the dual carriage way and dig the road up to bring an Earth into my house.

Crew turns up the new morning. Four vans. About a dozen men came traipsing out. A couple of them came into the house, rest of them unloading to shut road down, guy has a look at the fuse box and says, " yeah it's earthed, they just haven't pulled it through". Fixed it in two seconds, and they all packed up and left and I got sent 250 quid compensation. No shit.

I'd move in. Just don't have the boiler on when you're in bed or out.

No earth is not c1 it's c2 unless there are live parts exposed etc. But the question is the no earth just to the boiler in which case it's an easy fix or is the incoming earth faulty in which case it's a free fix from the electricity distribution company.
The final possibility is the main bonding is missing which is basically a connection between the incoming earth and the incoming gas and water pipes, and that is also a c2 in my opinion. People often call it earthing but it's not really.
Whichever it is it needs fixing and should be done soon.

Also gas Safe are right, the boiler fitter should not have commissioned the boiler until the earth was fixed, but they are within their rights to not fix it themselves as that depends what the problem is.
If the boiler just plugs in to existing wiring or into a fused unit then they should have tested it but the fault could be anywhere.
My recommendation would be fine another electrician and ask them to fix the earth to the boiler only, as an urgent callout, and leave the rest as it's probably the usual "no RCD on lighting" and other relatively unnecessary recommendations. You'd get a new consumer unit every 5 years for no reason if you listened to everyone who looked at the installation.

" the new boiler system is not earthed."

this is rather odd. What are the exact words on your certificate?

there are several things it might be.

OOI, how old is the house; what is the incoming water pipe made of; is the incoming gas pipe metal or plastic when it comes out of the ground? Do you have any plastic pipes?

In my own house, even if I went to the trouble of cutting off all the main and secondary bonding wires, the boiler would still be attached to all the metal pipes, and to the earthwire in the electrical supply, and, via copper pipes, to the earthwire in the immersion heater supply. It would be quite difficult to make it unearthed. Boilers are made of metal and all the pipes are attached to them. They are at their most dangerous when you take the boiler away and have all the pipes and cables close together around it, but not bonded together.

however, if it truly was unearthed, it would be dangerous. This is (supposed to be) the first thing an electrician or boiler installer looks at before he even opens his toolbox.

Post a photo of your consumer unit (with the flap open so we can read what's in it) and of the wires around it, your meter, and the incoming supply, if you can. The green and yellow striped wires are especially interesting.

sorry to post and run and thank you for all your advice. I've got it sorted now, managed to find an electrician to do the work that didn't take that long thankfully - so it's now safe to move into thankfully!

It's important to realise the difference between not earthed and not earth bonded. I would hazard a guess that the boiler itself was earthed but the cross bonding wasn't done. This is simply earth clamps across the pipes to ensure the earth bonding is equal across all the pipework in the house. Many houses do not have this and is only advisory to have the work done by an electrician. In many cases it's pointless IMHO due to many systems now being piped in plastic.