Charging lead rewire

[Grumpy-b]

Interesting thought about the cable. Have you ever used 1.5 or 1.75mm braided cable, its unforgiving, not flexible and probably more of a trip hazard owing to its inflexibility. I doubt that you could get it into a berlingo AVCON / Marechal connector, you certaily couldnt get it into a 13amp plug. 2.5mm is truely horrid from a flexibilty point, and storage isnt easy.
It is however very resilient to damage especially crushing/shearing loads.

Most London councils only allow you to charge from their points using their supplied cables. These being often bright yellow coiled leads. As supplied by the chargeing point companies.

Im not sure that suggesting armoured / braided cable is such a good idea. Dont forget most of our Berlingo cableas are at least ten years old. Mine are all in very good servicable condition. They are also nice and easy to store.

Grumpy-b

[EVan]

The SY cable that Tim mentioned isn't too bad, although it might be considered overkill.

Two points about the cables: I've heard of a rash of them going bad recently. They don't last forver and twice-daily use for 10 years, being plugged/unplugged at both ends and coiled up will take its toll.

So I would recommend replacing it every few years as a matter of course.

If the Earth wire opens (which mine did), you won't notice it until another fault happens, and that could be lethal, worst case.

Secondly, 1.5mm^2 rubber covered is what they were supplied with, and that's what I use to replace it with. This has the advantage of remaining flexible in cold weather (no, arctic flex doesn't!), and will lie flat nicely without looping up and causing a trip hazard.

If you have trouble locating some, B&Q sell a 6m roll for about £20, which seems to be reasonable quality - I recommended this to Evan too.

[Grumpy-b]

The earth issue is interesting. I have to get my leads PAT tested for use at work. But since it isnt an end to end test it would never show up. Its worth doing a cable check testing end to end and flexing it just to see if there are any problems. A job for tonight. My original cables seem to be of a high strand count much greater than normal cable seems to be. Hence the flexibility I guess.
The reason the London boroughs require you to use their coiled cables, is supposed to be on sagety grounds, ie they are bright and being coiled they arnt a trip hazard. But they do put the full weight of the lead, and anyone walking into them onto the plugs at both ends, at least a trailing cable lessens the plug load. Personally I dont like the idea. Bright colours not a problem, I dont like coiled leads though.
Not on an EV, but I have seen a 16amp socket ripped off the wall, the cable being so firmly gripped and the socket being so well joined to the plug. This was from the cable being driven over when it was already quite taught.

Grumpy-b

[EVan]

Another alternative for the black rubber covered cable, if you want something brighter, is Lapp Robotcable. This is available in 3 core and a range of sizes - the cover is bright orange, not PVC, and I'd say it's probably harder wearing and just as flexible as the rubber stuff.
I should try to remember that for next time!

[ChrisB]

The earth issue is interesting. I have to get my leads PAT tested for use at work. But since it isnt an end to end test it would never show up................

errrr sorry

So what the tests are they doing on it, surely not a Class2 test that is specifically for Double Insulated equipment, its a Class1 lead and thus MUST have an end to end test carried out on it or their basically not doing their job correctly

ChrisB

[Grumpy-b]

Our people take a simple uninformed approach. They never do an end to end test an anything. The cables get tested, and labled, They certainly never do end to end testing. But of course they make a huge fuss about doing this. Can you believe they our Facilities people who have control of the PAT testing, wont let a new piece of KIT supplied through our national IS group, be used until its been PAT tested (sorry the cable has been PAT tested) because they have not witnessed the New kit being installed. It makes me very angry.
This is a Quango with 11,000 staff. were all doomed!!
Still they are happy.

Grumpy-b

[ChrisB]

Our people take a simple uninformed approach. They never do an end to end test an anything. The cables get tested, and labled, They certainly never do end to end testing. But of course they make a huge fuss about doing this. Can you believe they our Facilities people who have control of the PAT testing, wont let a new piece of KIT supplied through our national IS group, be used until its been PAT tested (sorry the cable has been PAT tested) because they have not witnessed the New kit being installed. It makes me very angry.
This is a Quango with 11,000 staff. were all doomed!!
Still they are happy.

Grumpy-b

Well tell'em they are breaking several acts and regulations and I suspect the law by incorrectly carrying out the testing, lets see ....

Health & Safety at Work Act 1974, the Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations 1999, the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989, the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 and the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998

They cover all the PAT testing side of things

TBH it scares the living daylights out of me that you've got folk there that REALLY have no idea about how to test a bit of kit correctly they might as well just put a label on it cos if your not carrying out the correct test for an applaince the test is worthless along with the label.

Well suppose at the end of the day its their name on the ticket and if it kills comeone then more fool them, feel sorry for the poor bod that gets killed though due to someone else's incompetence, such a shame as its this sort of poor testing that gives the whole industry such a bad name

ChrisB

[Flying John]

I see that Lakeside want you to have your passport and a utility bill as ID before they let you use their recharge points. Makes you wonder whether they will want to see a PAT test sticker on your recharge cable before they allow you to use it.

[sticks]

Hi all,im a qualified sparks and have done alot of pat testing over the years,its difficult to p.a.t test one of these leads proply without plugging it into a load designed for the cable i.e the van/car all that would be checked is visual i.e the correct fuse and the cable safe clamp in the plug top to make sure it can be pulled out and also visable signs of wear and tear on the flex this is also done by gripping the flex in your hands and running it through to feel for insulation breakdown,then plug the lead into a pat test machine and do an insulation resistance and or earth leakage teat and VOILLA!!!

if anyone needs this done in london and can come to me i will do it for you and give you one of them loverly green pass labels or red if your unlucky,


when considering which flex to use always do this sum, voltage i.e 240 divided by the wattage of which the charge process will pull i.e 3000 or 3k watts

this will give you the ampage drawn and thus tells you which size cable you need and fuse size,

i personally would use a 2.5mm 3 core heavy duty flex

cheers and beers

[ChrisB]

Hi all,im a qualified sparks and have done alot of pat testing over the years......

Another one welcome to the club

Must admit I wouldnt do the 500vdc insulation test on the controller (i.e with the lead plugged into the van) especially as the controller measures its own insulation via 1/2 pack voltage, recon it could be an easy way to toast the controller

Were the berlingos ever designed to be PAT'd?? I doubt it, thus I wont test mine, I'd test the lead and check the earth cont. with a low voltage multimeter to the van, but that would be about it, I might show the tester to the van but thats as far as I would ever go

Had far too many bits of kit suffer at the hands of the 25amp earth test in the early days of PAT testing that and the 500vdc insulation test at least the modern testers give you the option to drop down to 30mA or less on the earth test



ChrisB