Teardown of an old British Wylex electrical fuse box. (with bare fuse wires)
Having looked at a modern home electrical distribution unit (called a consumer unit in the UK) I thought it would be interesting to take a look at an old fuse box.
This one dates back a long way, but was still available up until about 10 years ago. It's a very robust and reliable unit with fuse holders that can be fitted with new bare fuse wires.
The main issue with fuse boxes like these is that people can use incorrect fuse wire and risk damaging the wiring in their home. They also lack the integrated earth/ground fault detection that is common in new circuit breaker based panels.
For reference the tinned copper fuse wire sizes are:-
5A - 35 SWG
15A - 26 SWG
20A - 25 SWG
30A - 22 SWG
You can buy rolls or cards of bare fuse wire.
If you enjoy these videos you can help support the channel with a dollar for coffee, cookies and random gadgets for disassembly at:-
www.bigclive.com/coffee.htm
This also keeps the channel independent of KZhead's advertising algorithms allowing it to be a bit more dangerous and naughty.
Re: using the correct fusewire: when my parents lived in a terraced house in Edinburgh, a fuse blew in a similar, but perhaps older, consumer unit and my father (armed with a degree in physiology) did a "temporary" fix with one of my mother's hairgrips, meaning to put the proper wire in as soon as possible. Then they moved to Hampshire, I was born and, generally speaking, the hairgrip was forgotten. Years passed, we went on a camping holiday in Scotland. On the way home (the family now lived in Hertfordshire), my parents decided to call in and introduce their offspring to their old next door neighbour. This was convivial, but as we were leaving, my father had a sudden crisis of conscience and asked the people now living in his old house, if he could just take a look at the fusebox inside the front door. The hairgrip was still in place, still doing its job... My father died only recently, at the perhaps surprising age of 97.
That job being a solid conductor rather than a fuse :D My sister's ex used to remove a blown fuse from a plug, wrap it in tinfoil and put it back in the plug. After she flung him out I went round her house and checked every plug and found no less than 4 of his bodges.
@@krashd I think the prize actually goes to my English teacher, Alan Greaves Myers (who attained international fame as a translator of Russian literature). He had a problem when the school had a budget for audio-visual equipment which didn't appear to run to mains plugs. With a hall full of pupils waiting to see a video tape, rather than go to classrooms and actually work, he twisted the ends of the three bare wires and showed about 140 of us how to secure them in the square-pin socket holes with match-sticks. Nobody grassed him up to the physics teacher, who was nominally responsible for insuring electrical safety in the school. I don't think the young people today have any idea of what REAL teachers used to be like.
@@krashd I remember my uncle doing that as a kid.. mind you he rolled a JCB on a flat street???
40 years ago, my Radio Shack 150-in-1 electronics project kit had a quote in the manual: "There are old technicians, and there are bold technicians, but there are NO old, bold technicians." I must have taken it to heart, since I'm still here... Thanks for making a humble fusebox so interesting!
I'm not an electrician but I thoroughly enjoyed this video. I have a smaller 3 fuse Wylex in my garage where I plug my Tesla 3 pin plug in for slow charging. You video has demystified that setup nicely 😊 thank you 👍🏼😊
You realise you are getting old when Big Clive calls a fuse box similar to the ones you grew up "Vintage"
Yer vintage now Kevin. Cheers.
I am old and fitted hundreds of Wylex consumer units!
same fuse box as mine! guess i need to think about a rewire soon
You're right, these fuse box's were modern. I remember the old individual pot fuse holders prior to consumer units!
Phillip Kawasaki, bigclive (and readers here) might be interested to hear about your experiences with those lethal boxes.
When I was 5 the council replaced the fuse box in our flat. I asked if I could have it and they gave it to me. I took it apart and put it back together many times, even taking it to school to show my class :)
When I was about 7 or 8, our council house was rewired. This was the 1960s. Then in 2004 I worked in the electrical department of the local council, as did the man who had been the apprentice on the rewire. Naturally I told him there were still a few snagging issues left to resolve, and asked when he could come round to sort them out. 🙂
It is awesome they gave it to you. As a kid I asked a man at a TV repair shop if he had any old circuit boards he was throwing away, he went in the back and brought two out. I spent years just looking at them, reading part numbers on the components, and learning what each thing was even if I didn't fully understand how they worked. The shop owner also warned me of the dangers of the high voltage inside the tv and how the capacitors would hold a charge and shock me in case I was thinking about taking apart a working TV.
@@christopher88719 aww I did the same :D I was forever asking people if they had any circuit boards :D
@@Elastane That is really awesome! It amazes me how kids are able to know so early on about what will likely become a lifetime passion for them. I imagine since you are watching BigClives videos your interest in circuitry has never died down.
@Rick Delair That is really cool! You knew it was your interest as kid! Your story reminds me of being a kid I would always go to the tire section at stores like Sears or Price Club, I was always so interested in cars so I would just walk around looking at all the new tires. As an adult, I have been an automotive tech for 20 years now. I could have told you at 4 that's what I wanted to do. The sad part was that no high schools in my area offered any type of auto shop. They closed them all down years before I attended. I had to go off campus across town to take an automotive program. As for your hobby with lights, I have been working on learning CRT TV repair. I am currently restoring a 1959 Philco Predictia television. Sadly with new HD flat screens just like forced LED light bulbs, not only has all CRT TVs been thrown in landfills, the shops of skilled TV repairman have all gone extinct. I have been collecting all the specialist CRT TV and old vacuum tube radio test equipment that has been ending up on eBay for pennies. I have about a full TV repair shop of tools now. I am glad you have the passion to collect and preserve what would otherwise be lost. Those lightbulbs are so important as they were the first generation of actual electric lighting, something that is taken so for granted people rarely remember that less than 100 years ago you were lighting the way with a flame.
You know you spend too much time fixing other people’s houses electrics when your shed still has this in but you’re a qualified electrician 😂
Clive, some years ago I was sat with my grandchildren watching Peppa Pig. (happy memories). My daughter-in-law opened the door to a cupboard under the stairs and shouted fire! I was able to gather up some burning plastic bags and dump them in the kitchen so we could put the fire out. The cause was a wire fuse (as shown in your video) had blown. A hot glob of molten fuse had dropped onto the combustible material stored or should that be shoved in below. We changed to a modern breaker system (?) with in the week! Yes, Clive, the cover had been lost!
You nearly gave me a heart attack with your liberal display of "asbestos"... Nicely done :-D
I put duct tape over my dryer's lint trap just in case. :D
I grew up in Quebec, not far away from one of the world's biggest asbestos mines, there's a town literally called Asbestos there. Our government was one of the last one to ban asbestos. It's still kind of surprising to me seeing how people freak out about asbestos. When I grew up, all we heard was that it wasn't all that bad, that you should just limit long term exposure. I'm pretty sure handling asbestos in your hands for a couple minutes, like you pretended doing, would not have been considered a big deal around here in my youth.
Olivier Engelkes I used to work in Iron ore in the main area in Australia which produced blue asbestos... I was trying to work out where the other colours in there came from for a second😂 There is a very pretty rock that gets quarried out of the BIF they call tiger iron which can look like landscape paintings... or modern art which is from iron oxide replacement of the asbestos which originally filled the fault or whatever... people sell it on eBay and some of it looks a lot like that (the colours not the swirling) when you crush it a bit... because not all the asbestos is replaced
@@gfilion that it probably was not considered a big thing back then is a testament to how effective the industry’s efforts to cover up the risks were.
@@gfilion You can handle asbestos however long you want. I've seem mesothelioma and I say better safe then miserable
Concur with your contempt for lawyers. Well said.
at least those fuse holders are a lot safer than the screw-in type common in north america prior to the introduction of resetable circuit breakers. very vividly remember as a toddler, watching my grandpa go down the dark basement stairs to jam a coin in a fuse holder, then screw the blown fuse over the top of it, because he was out of replacement fuses on a sunday night. as soon as my grandpa plugged the (faulty) crockpot that blew the fuse back in, that coin turned into a blast of plasma that melted through the blown fuse, and a good amount of everything else in the panel. guess who had to use plumbers candles to light the house, give his grandchildren a cold dinner, and wait until monday morning when the town electrician could come in and replace the whole panel? xD I don't fault my grandpa though-- he grew up in a town with hardly any electrified anything, and having dropped out of school in 5th grade to help support his family, a lot of his technical skills were self taught or learned on his job as a mechanic in a cloth mill. hence, a lot of trial and a LOT of errors. amazing he had (most) of all his digits by his death at age 80... he was missing the tip of his left thumb though. that's how he learned about riving knives...
It's amazing how a lot of older folks like your Grandpa made it to such an old age, what with all the health and safety warnings on everything these days.
@@uK8cvPAq Of course, plenty of them didnt... selection bias and all that.
I've known people who followed all the safety guidance and still didn't make it past 60, yet there's been people who've done all sorts and smoked like chimneys and are well into their 80's today.
Grew up in a house that still had those diazed fuses. (We had them over here in Europe as well). It was kinda a regular occurrence one would blow. Strange now that I'm thinking about it. Maybe they were a bit like light bulbs, just blew with age and use. I do remember my father using aluminum foil when there where no spares. Haha!
Also, a lot of modern circuit breaker boxes leave plenty of the live bus completely exposed once you remove the whole front panel. It's really interesting how they try to cover as best as possible every connection in the UK. This even goes for light switches and wall outlets.
I had such a fusebox or consumer unit in my last house. At one time, I noticed a burning smell whenever I used the washing machine, which I eventually traced to the fusebox. Basically, the screw holding the live wire to the fuse holder was loose and it had been arcing. The plastic on the whole of that section had melted and the copper connectors were only held in place by the wires. Since there was a spare slot further along, I was able to move the fuse and the associated wiring to the spare slot. Moral of the story - make sure the screws are tight, but not so tight as to punch through the wire. And as for the asbestos, my parents had an asbestos mat, that they used to put between the top of the cooker and a saucepan whenever they wanted a really low heat. It reduced the heat of the flame to just the right amount to keep food warm whilst not burning it. When not in use, this asbestos mat was just thrown into one of the kitchen draws. I've no idea what became of it.
Grew up with those as a kid. Dad taught me so I could be the one who replaced the fuses wire if he was at work, there was always a cardboard wire holder balanced on top of the box - just in case it was needed. And also just in case he had a mains testing screwdriver (looked like a neon and resistor) to test that it really was turned off. I never worked out how it was safe to test for live wires by putting his thumb on the end of the screwdriver handle and checking it didn't light up. Totally surprised to see those still available from toolstation today. I'd expected health and safety to get rid of them! By the time my parents died and we were clearing the house, the rubber covered wiring had deteriorated to the point I just turned the boxes off on every floor just for safety.
My Nan and Grandad still has one of them, complete with a broken isolator, rust, burning to the cover, and a cracked lid
I think they possibly always looked like that, as soon as they were installed. ISTR every fuse style consumer unit I've ever seen was busted up exactly like you described. XD
Jesus Christ Clive, you scared the crap out of me with that “blue asbestos”!
I was wondering how many people will be screaming at their monitors when I show the fluff.
You should have given it a sniff just to add that extra fear factor for the easily scared viewers 😂👍🏼
I was too!
As the little wisps of dust rose up I think my heart stopped....I should have known better though. Would have made an excellent stand alone April fool’s/Halloween video “Look at this funny blue fluff I found at a work site, it doesn’t burn! I wonder what it is? It smells kind of funny too!”
I saw it and was like 'Woaaaaaaah that looks like my tumble drier lint!' then he said >_
I’m glad you pointed out the fact that theses old beauties are still compliant as long as they are in good condition as this one clearly is. I’m sure you know there is no legal or regulation requirement to change them . When we test older installations we can sign it off as safe for continued service as long as all the test readings are within the specified limits set out in BS7671. Page 99 in the onsite guide makes it clear. Also the fuse come in as white =5amp blue 15 amp yellow 20 amp red 30 amp green 45 amp and orange 50amp there was a purple that was 60amp but was very very rarely used in domestic installations. The most common was the 5 15 20 and 30 amp fuses. Also I think you will find that the main switch is double pole ie i breaks the line and neutral. Even the one with the plastic cover and wooden base are still compliant if in good condition. As for the fuses I have seen were some people replace the blown fuse wire with a nail or a paper clip even a peace of kitchen foil. Fantastic video as always Mate 👍
Brings back memories, worked on loads of these and ripped a fair few out too. Also the push button MCB replacements for the fuses. Most of the versions I worked with had a plastic front case and a wood backbox.
God, I love that island. Everybody drives on the left and the switches are down for on and up for off. Not to mention the water taps. :))
Of course everybody drives on the left.....if only half of us did it that would cause problems. The taps here do drive me nuts though, also baths instead of showers. >.
Kizron Kizronson the other day I briefly saw on the BBC a contraption where there was a bath with the two separate taps above, and no shower... but a shower was provided in the form of a rubber hose that you could slide across both taps and that then joined in the middle and led to a -handheld only natch - shower head.
Don't knock it mate, all those things were invented in the UK, it was the USA that ended up with everything the wrong way round. 🤔🤣
@@JasperJanssen Yeah,those things are terrible. The most popular option seems to be a "power shower" Which goes on the wall above the taps and which basically heats the water on demand as it flows through to a shower head.
@@Kizron_Kizronson That's not a "Power Shower", A power shower has it's own water pump. An electric shower has only a cold feed, a mixer or bar shower has both hot and cold feeds, both come in power and normal flavours.
I liked this one. While I don't live in the UK, it was still interesting to see how a different country approached the solution to the problem of getting power safely into homes.
Definitely agree. I was born in the late 70s in the US and I remember my parents' first house had the screw in type fuses (see link). -- upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Edison-base-and-Type-S-fuses.jpg
@@OAleathaO They are as reliable as the more modern circuit breaker type, the only drawback is you have to keep fuses on hand.
@@OAleathaO Never had those as a kid myself, our house had breakers, but I always wondered if you could screw light bulbs into the fuse sockets. :P Figured it would show you which one had blown easily, and lightbulbs were cheap. (Of course, as a kid, I figured 'fuses blow, lightbulbs blow, fuse = lightbulb'.)
@@DijonFromage They really are quite similar, too - a thin metal wire that heats up, and a holder. Only real difference is the lightbulb is thoughtfully constructed to handle getting a lot hotter. :)
@@OAleathaO still plenty of them around and in use in the notheast
Stumbled across this channel last night. I'm rubbish with electrics, but this is really really educational and fascinating at the same time. Could listen to you talk all day sir. Keep up the good work.
I seem to recall the older wooden-cased MEM boards (which my mother-in-law has) had much bigger pieces of asbestos in the fuse bridges to contain the flash. These Wylex boards are just wonderful to look at with their design. Thanks for making a rubbish day better :)
I'm currently working at the old Wylex works, they have been bought out by Electrium now. They still make consumer units, but the bit I'm working in makes protection cubicles for National Grid and wind farm jobs.
What do you call 10,000 lawyers at the bottom of the ocean? A good start.
Just seen this on the film Philidelphia I watched an hour ago coincidentally
Must be why they call lawyers Land Sharks! 😡😡
Just brings a smile to my face seeing an old fusebox like this. Back in my younger days, my grandparents lived on a farm in RSA, and the old man was a well known electrician, and obviously me being young, I would take apart everything I touch, including a fusebox similar to the one in this video that he was repairing for the hospital😂
It would be cool to see you go over an American style fuse box and see how much different they are to the UK ones!
LOL, I just commented about US fuse boxes, before I saw this request. It would be interesting to see his take on one!
It would be. Not only are they huge, but the US split-phase system is fundamentally different, so would make for an interesting comparison.
@pmailkeey I would, except my landlord wouldn't be too happy with me, 😂
@@TheEulerID the split phase North American standard home panel is just like what I hear you use for industrial three phase, except it's only got 2 buss bars instead of 3. You commercial stuff is pretty normal in other words, just your consumer stuff is wierd! Lol
I'll send in mine in from France when I get round to updating it. There is an alarming amount of porcelain still in use around the house!
"ham-fisted monkeyforce" is the anime we've all been waiting for.
The first one to say something about what I was going to comment on however a bit different in my case. What I was going to say was the term I've heard from this kind of thing was a hundred pound gorilla thing on the tool. Such as a v e it says all the time and others. Even several of my friends have always called it that even been before KZhead existed.
I was working on new build houses when the new regs abolished rewireable fuses, I asked the boss why he didn't use the MCB's? Because they cost £5.50 each against £1.25 for the fuses, was his smug self-satisfied reply. He soon changed his tune when he found out that every time a light-bulb blew it took the 6a cartridge fuse with it...as he was giving the electrical installation a 1 year warranty, he had to send people on tours of central Scotland changing fuses at his expense. He liked that even less than stumping up for the proper gear..RIP Jimmy Hynd.
I should do one of these on an Australian board of the same era. Lots of differences and our rewire-able fuses were a death trap. Love your work from an Aussie sparky from the lift industry.
That little bit about asbestos reminded me that still after years the old roof and guttering of the scout hall is still in a pile in the side garden due to the price to have it removed.
Oh Clive, you should definitely get your hands on an old German fuse panel with the screw-in fuse covers with an E27 thread (or something alike). These things are awesome! Also, replacing a fuse with a nail was made really easy by them :-)
One safety feature I think you missed when comparing the different size fuse carriers is that the pin thickness increases in size with the higher amperage - not just for the higher current but it also meant that you can't accidentally/on-purpose put a 30A fuse carrier in your lighting circuit because the slots in the bases correspond accordingly
Hi, you beat me to the comment haha.
You and the Canadian, both stirling examples of good human beings. Calling out industry.
I fixed the old fuse box in my apartment this morning using this video. 10:43 was particularly helpful !
In 1984 I was 14. I got a work permit to help clean up a train derailment in Barstow California. It was my first job. On the 3rd day there were only 2 of us left on the job. This railroad cart was laying on its side and was full of loose asbestos! I had no idea what it was I was 14 yrs old. The cleanup job was subcontracted out. The boss gave the other guy and myself. Paper mask, a big roll of plastic trash bags and a big snow shovel. It took us both 3 days to finish that one railroad cart. Asbestos was flying everywhere! And I do mean everywhere!!! I remember my mother washing my clothes explaining to me..." they were breaking the law and not supposed to be having me work in the asbestos!" Thank God every time I go to the hospital I have my lungs x-rayed and all seems to be okay! The other fellow was a Mexican guy ( illegal immigrant) he did not speak a word of English, I did not speak a word of Spanish. We work together for 3 days and got it done. I wonder if he still alive from that? Those cheap $1 paper mask I'm sure did not help at all! *EDITED P.S. I remember the asbestos being white or slightly grayish, Fibers flying all over!
It was probably white Chrysotile asbestos. Don't worry too much as the exposure was nothing compared to working with it all the time and that type of asbestos can be dealt with by your body. It literally dissolves and expels it from your lungs, so you should be fine.
@@bigclivedotcom thank you for responding back to my message Clive. I would say you're probably right on this. I was wondering how is it possible to have so much asbestos flying around, it was in my hair, clothes and all over my body, without any bad effects? I just prayed it was Miracle from up above! But what you're saying makes a lot of sense thank you!
@Matt Quinn I'm sorry you have COPD. My mother had COPD, but she smoked all the time even until the end. That's not what took her though. It was her heart and two open heart surgeries. We got an extra 20 years out of her with those surgeries. I wish she could have got into vaping. Vaping was just starting to get popular when she passed in 2011. Vaping help me quit smoking 4 years ago. My doctor was very happy with my choice! My friends and I used to build a lot of forts out of stuff when we were younger. Fun times :-) There's a lot of things that might come to haunt me in the years to come that I used to do. I pray your lungs improve and you have many enjoyable years to come!
Hah ! a relatively modern fuse box, I recently saw a flat which had had the wooden fuse box still installed, unfortunately the woodworm liked it and it had become a standalone set of fuses and wiring !
Growing up in Germany and now living in Sweden safety of electrical installations has always been a major concern of authorities in these countries. Seeing fuses were you replace the fuse wire yourself instead of replacing a sealed cartridge gives me the shivers...
Mine dates from 1977 when my house was rewired. It has a Bakelite front cover, so that arcing during a fuseblow would not occur. It is also fitted with a main overall fuse to the right of the switch. I fitted min-breakers instead of the fusewire fuses you showed.
Good job you mentioned John ward , great video Clive keep me coming 👍
Good old Wylex units, they must have been the dogs danglers back in the days you see so many of them around. Simple and effective for the days of "personal responsibility" when if you got hurt 90% of the time it really was your own bloody fault.
@ihatespam1977 We run all 240v in the UK, it doesn't play nice if you get on the wrong side of it.
Go back 50 years you learnt to do the job properly, and you wouldn't get your nuts burnt.
I agree, but this thing looks like you can accidentally flip the switch back to on when you are working in the fusebox.
@@Leo-pd8ww trust me, you can. You can even take the cover off it switched on. The later plastic ones you, at least, have to remove the rewirable fuses carriers before you can remove the cover.
In the early 2000s the split RCD wylex boards took over the same way as these . Most jobs now are a wylex split way RCD but recently a lot of common ones are the budget friendly British General boxes from Screwfix
Oh, the color of brass and copper. It just radiates old times robustness. Love ❤️ it.
Also the small screws that are of a quality that hasn't been seen in any electrical device for years. They are also brass whereas most modern ones are steel.
Daniel Gray Exactly!
Completely same wylex fuse box are still in use on my grandma's house in cyprus. I think it was built in 1970's and they are still rocking without any problems. However, i want to change them with new type of circuit breakers because of the safety concerns. Nice video!
My dad worked for VSEL as a pipefitter, and confirmed a long time ago about his buddies having asbestos fights. He never trusted the stuff and didn't participate. No mesothelioma for him and he's almost 80 now!
Have patience
Ours never had a cover. Didn't even know that existed until now. Ours looked like that with the fuses, I remember the fun colours and that I wasn't allowed to play with it. I remember when circuit breakers were invented because we didn't have to wait for mum or dad to find the right fuse wire and cut it and put new bits in.
Thank you for yet another video for Friday! I hope you're well and I wish you a happy weekend. :)
I had one of these units in my old flat around 2012/2013, and had to change the fuse wire one day. I did exactly what you described at 1:35, blowing the 100A main fuse for the block of flats. The guy who came out from the electricity board let me keep the fuse! When it happened it was as if a flashbang had gone off in my hall and I couldn't hear or see for a good 10 seconds after, and gained a very healthy respect (some might say fear) for electricity after that. My wife would tell you that I couldn't even change a light bulb for a few years after that happened.
I'd love to see youdo a teardown, give opinions on a US breaker box
I used to fit Wylex consumer units in early 70's they had a hardwood frame with a full plastic cover where yours was metal
The house I bought 5 years ago was built in 1985 and that had installed a wooden Wyler DB, it was soon taken out when I rewired my house, but who’s idea was it to go from metal to wooded DB,
Thanks for the video Clive. Ive got one of the units in my rented flat.. It has had the front cover cut out so that a circuit breaker can be plugged in. Ive just screwed the cover back on. ! Ive also got an external RCD fitted next to it.. This covers the electric shower. When it was fitted the electrician ( cough ) managed to wire it into the cooker cable. So when I tried my new shower and hit the TEST button. The shower stayed working, but the washing machine stopped !! ( it was plugged in to the single socket of the cooker panel ) Guess he didn't check his work after he had finished ! I also have two 5a circuits that do lighting. Front and rear lights.. But since the shower fiasco all the lights seem to be on just one fuse. My flat was built in 1981-2
My parents house had this type with rewirable fuses when I was growing up. It helped me to understand at a young age the dangers of electricity and how to handle electrical items safely as my dad would teach me how to safely rewire a blown fuse, along with rewiring plugs, etc. Things I feel even only being 30 myself, are still useful skills that the kids now do not possess.
Very interesting. !! I've been waiting for more UK home wiring vids. I enjoy comparing to the US system. Might you do UK distribution systems one day ?
This is a 50 year old one...
Got a similar 4 port unit made of bakelite (i think) in the cellar of my house built in 1900, I believe it was installed in the 50s, still working!
And probably STILL will be in 2050!
Bi-metallic contacts, in my younger years I worked at a place where these were produced in Sheffield. Keep up the great videos.
We still have one of those. Some years ago, I was replacing one of the 5A fuses and commented to my son "I hope this doesn't go bang" - at which point it went bang. Turned out there was a fault with the kitchen light.
(10:56) - That white plastic on/off tab comes off easily. Just put the switch to the "ON" position first. .
But he wanted it off ...
Clive, I really appreciate you showing this 'vintage' stuff. It shows how we have gone from practical designs, made to be fixed or repaired by anyone, and how things have improved over time. While you could easily replace any one particular item on this panel, it is kind of clunky. Then compare this to today's new fangled, disposable economy where if a fuse blows, you throw it away and replace it with a new one.
10:00 at least in Finland, the old cinemas also had to have fused drop doors in the projection/peep windows, those would fall to cover the windows if there was a hot enough fire in the booth. But I bet this was approximately universal. Also it was mostly forbidden to have a direct access route inside the building between the booth and areas which patrons had access to. I work in two cinemas, one built in 1939 and another 1958. The latter has had a metal winding staircase put in in the 70's so we don't have to run around the building. The former retains the original structure and I think the building is protected so notable structural changes are not allowed. It is actually one of the oldest cinemas in Finland that has been operating all the time - the pandemic was the first thing for which we were closed for more than a few weeks. There are, though, 100ish year old (even wooden) houses where a cinema has been operating at some time, and almost by sheer luck only a few have had a fire.
We still have these and much older ones at work. When they burn out they tend to smolder rather than actually burn. Talking asbestos the control panel I had to fix this week was wired in asbestos covers solid copper cable with clockwork timers and open frame contractors such fun. Built circa 1930 by Vickers.
My parents home still has one of these, mind you it's never failed.
My parent's home too. I installed it in 1979 when I was 17 year old electrical apprentice. Worked great then and still works great today.
Wylex standard boards were awesome, so well made. Connecting the main earth to the external screws is normal, the earth bar terminals are very small. It's important to note that the fuse ways here are rated maximum 30A. Some Wylex boards had a single higher rated way next to or the other side of the main switch. A high current way can easily be identified as the contacts are in separate parts, silver coloured and held in place with a pair of screws. I have only once ever seen one of these burnt, but not to the point of fire. A ring circuit was wired into a 15A fuseway, the circuit was heavily loaded with a 3KW pool heater running 24hours, and a tumble drier and washing machine, the load was not enough to blow the fuse, but enough that the 15A fuse ran very hot. A section of the plastic cover above the fuse was charred and crumbled away,but the rest of the unit was in surprisingly good condition. A newer plastic unit would have melted badly. The dual screw all brass construction terminals are very reliable. I wish manufacturers would still use these, instead of mixing different types of metals, and using weak clamp terminals, especially for main switches and RCDs.
That consumer unit is very similar to the one I replaced when I re-wired my first house (back in the day when such things were legal - the only "safety assessment" was the visit form the local Supply Authority (in my case SWEB) to confirm that the installation was safe for re-connection to the incomer. My Grandparents' home had the far older white ceramic rewireable fuses - with the obligatory card carrying 5 A (lighting), 15 A (ring main) and 30 A (Cooker) fusewire. Grandfather's standard repair when a fuse blew was to use a single strand of copper (lights), or three strands (ring main). Sometimes wonder how we all managed to survive in those bygone days!!
I still have a small 4 port one of these in my house, though made of plastic. No cover. It does have one barrel fuse type and the others are RCD breakers. At some point a shower or cooker circuit was added as a single fuse board extension. A lovely but small wire nest to the mains coming in and the meter. Oh so attractive.
If only a £1 for everyone I installed in my younger days. Mainly conduit connected factory enviroments. Great to work with. Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
They were pretty good to work with. Nice and robust.
@@bigclivedotcom They certainly were my good friend. Have a great day.
I took an old fuse box off at work once that was actually a DIY wooden one, introduced when electricity was first introduced. its probably more than 100 years old.
The one and only time i came across blue Asbestos was from the power generation plant, it was in a glass jar as a display piece so you knew what to look out for. enjoyed the asbestos rant, thanks for the video!
I loved watching this. My Father was an Electrical Contractor and I loved watching him stripping things down and I tormented him with my questions. Your comments on asbestos struck a cord. My Father was terrified of developing asbestosis or mesothelioma. Back in the day he said that in some cellars and buildings the asbestos could be seen floating in the air where the plumbers had cut through lagging. He happily worked on stuff live as it was easier, but he was always worrying about asbestos. He died unexpectedly, and they found that he had an anomaly in his lungs. Maybe he was right to worry after all.
It's a concern for every construction worker from that era.
0:38 - "However, I digress...as is so often the case." And that is one of the many things that makes this channel so great. I love it when BigClive relates to us things from his past experiences.
Had me legit worried with the 'blue asbestos' part, but hearing it was something else was a relief like when a cop flips their lights on behind you but they pull someone else over. Keep safe and take it easy, Mr. Clive!
Thanks for this, my parents still have a fuse box in their 1970's home. I also know for a fact that their wiring is horrid, with each plug socket conected to the ringmain via a spur. A lot of work for me, when they kick-the-bucket.
Interesting stuff, I remember doing all this when I was younger and one of the most interesting and no longer used "safety devices" was the Voltage Operated Earth Leakage Circuit Breaker
Do you mean the original ELCB that used a coil to sense earth current flow?
I'd always argue that our British standards for electrical gear have always been the best designed, most sensible, and safest, except for one embarrassment that you see has been partially corrected in later units. That is: 'Down is on' switches. Clearly, something dropping past such a switch can accidentally turn them on. I'd love all switches to change over to the other way around (even though the risk is small in most cases).
I knew a girl from a former British colony who was here in the US and her complaint was that the switches were backwards! On is supposed to be down, *not* up! 😆😆
I worked in a chemical lab. We converted a lab to a computer room, all very cool in 1979. When we took out the asbestos covered steam lines, we had a sword fight. Lots of dust. Ph.D. students. What can you say.
I have a Wylex fuse box, and I personally did the conversion from fuses to breakers, and broke out the front of the cover. Still works.
When that box was new it was painted. An arc simply won’t happen. They were very reliable units & still in use today
Interesting fact about asbestos: if melted down, it turns into glass that about strong as plexi and is no longer dangerous, asbestos glass has a lot of potential that has yet to be put to the test.
The trouble is the mining and handling of it before it gets melted down. Those fibres are very invasive. If you work with the stuff then no matter what dust protection you wear you will inevitable breathe in a lot more than a normal person. One of the things that rile me is asbestos removal companies that basically involve a greedy businessman using the cheapest labour they can get to do the work in paper overalls and token gesture dust masks. The longer those labourers work there the more chance there is of life limiting effects.
@@bigclivedotcom that's what i have been reading is the thing that has stopping them from selling it and theirs some research being done hoping to change that problem
@@TT-RR - See my comment above about short and long fiber asbestos.
I recall changing fuse wires in ones like this when I were a lad...
Same, they wouldn't come out on a Saturday night to fix a fuse, so hunting for fuse wire and fixing it yourself..
I bought a house in the 90's and the consumer unit was wooden with lovely porcelain fuse holders. I also have that beautiful Wera screw Driver set LOL
Got this exact model at home, solid,dependable and unlikely to burn the house down unlike the cheaper plastic types today, just had it inspected and everything is fine, had an in line RCD fitted to the board supply, and good for years to come.
Blue asbestos looks like my belly button fluff
"lovely affect of the rust" 🤣
I remember the fuse wire cards that would be sold on those racks with various “useful” items like sewing kits, nail clippers, Taylor’s tape measures & brass plate hooks.
corr that takes me back ! my uncle had one in his first house i seem to remember it kept tripping a lot
On that cooker fuse, if you were to grossly exceed the rated breaking capacity, would you get an English Electric Lightning?
I think Big Clive is Scottish
lol, I love how everyone was freaking out thinking the dryer lint was asbestos
This is /Clive/ we're talking about..
Speaking of asbestos, there's a town in Australia that's so contaminated with asbestos that it was taken off the map. They removed road signs to it and stopped upkeeping the roads. Look up Wittenoom
I have exactly the same in the house we have just bought. White plastic box same as the layout of the box in this video. We’ve had one or two power cuts in the road since we moved in and each time we somehow still have power when no one else does! Must be the fact that these old units don’t trip like the new ones. The greatest thing is the sticker on the front saying last serviced in 1987!
I seem to remember you could not take the cover off until all the fuse carriers were removed. It might have been the plastic cover.
That's correct, just ripped an 80s plastic and wood (!) model out of my house.
That's right with the bakalite version you had to remove the fuses and switch the power off before the cover could be removed, cheers
My dad spent 1959-1996 in the electrical trade, he only has one working lung & that one only half works, non-cancerous asbestosis.
What caused such bad lung damage? Asbestos, smoking, something else? Does he need to carry an oxygen tank with him?
@@simontay4851 nah, he doesn't cary oxygen, it would have been mostly the asbestos, he only smoke a pipe or a cigar once a week.
Mesothelioma is the worst cancer and is usually deadly.
My parents house had one of these but it was a different variant as the casing was black bakelite rather than metal but the layout was identical to this one! I was always curious as to what it looked like inside and now I know. Good point if you find one of these in your house to check the fuse wires if someone else has lived there previously. I fondly remember replacing both the wire and fuses in those cartridges. The front cover was absent on ours which looking back was risky as there were combustibles nearby. My folks replaced theirs with a modern RCD unit about 20 years ago. Great video and very interesting!
Hi Clive, I used to do some work for a bathroom company and was at a job to install a shower. When I removed the front of the fuse box, which was exactly like the one you show, I was a bit surprised to see that there was absolutely NO insulation on any of the cables inside with the exception of the tails incoming. I have never seen it since or before. The cables were the old rubber type and outside of the box were perfectly normal looking. The only thing that was rubber and had survived were the grommets in the top knockouts luckily. Every other bit of rubber insulation from the cables was just piled up in the bottom of the box where it had dropped off in crusty bits and when installed Earth sleeving didn't exist. My sparky comrades out there will be able to imagine the sight I think. When I condemned the box and showed the owner saying it would need drastic action she thought I was touting for more work! This was in the 80's and no camera phones or there would be some amazing pictures of the bad stuff I came across. Keep up the excellent content mate. Al
The old crumbling rubber insulation is still in widespread use in the UK.
Curious about the name of that solicitors that stalled the legal cases...
Satan, I'm sure his name is Satan.
I've told this one a few times. As a 10 year old i figured out the fuse wire in the fuses could be replaced. We had a similar box, brown bakealite cover and it was filled with the slightly longer fuses. My father used to go to the nearby diy shop, and buy a new fuse. Near our box we had two fuse wires on wooden bobbins. One had 5A and the other 15A written on the top. When daddy was at work a fuse went. I opened the fuse saw the burnt wire and screws. Wondering if I could replace it with the same A wire? I was so happy with my find, upon my dad's return I told him. I was ignored but still I was so full of happiness I went and wired up the 5+ spare fuses sitting above the box.
Big Clive!! I am literally a brand new electrical engineering technician... I totally wish I could just live with you for like a year and gain some of those skills!! I have soooooo much to learn still. The test was easy though, just programming PLC for a 4-way traffic light with turning lanes.... well.... it was just a 4-way... but I programmed in the turning lanes also so I would stand out from the rest. It worked beautifully btw!!
Went down a rabbit hole researching asbestos after watching this video and it's facinating stuff. I didn't know people were using it for so long. I had assumed it was a relatively modern discovery, but that's not so.
In old houses in iraq i saw the same fuse boxs in this video .
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Used to have a similar box. I installed the breakers (more expensive than standard MCBs) but one limitation is the lid doesn't fit over them. I also added an RCD between the box and the meter.
I remember seeing a unit or two like that when I was very young. Both my parents' and grandparent's houses are quite old structures so I'm pretty sure they had fuses similar to that. My parents' house I think has since been upgraded but I think my grandparent's hasn't. I'm pretty sure the one I saw had a transparent plastic cover over the fuses rather than opaque.
The first recorded mention of health problems caused by asbestos was by Pliny the Elder, in ancient Greece, about 5000 years ago. The companies knew, they just didn't think worker's health was important.
I'd like to see Clive analyze a US style electrical panel.
That would be interesting
I can't even comprehend that people used to just replace the fuse wire with bare copper wire like that. The "old" fuseboxes here in North America use the glass screw-in type fuses, that use an Edison-style screw. The colour inside the fuse tells you its rating. Then, we switched to using breakers, and now they're just all in neat rows. It seems crazy to me to allow people to rewire fuses. How many times did someone's house burn down because they just used any old wire they could find? That being said, you can push a penny or a quarter into the screw-type fuse boxes here to totally bypass them as well... so breakers really are the best thing nowadays.
I just sold a house with one of these, I always put the cover back on after playing with the fuses, I did it more because it seemed like that was a good idea. Its nice to know why.