Surely this wire isn't live, right?

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Mander

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Getting my bathroom redone has turned out to be a cursed project. Every few days something else goes wrong.

The new pipes that lead to the bath taps started leaking overnight, dripping through the ceiling below. Fortunately ? the floorboards are still partly up so I could see where the leak is. Conveniently there are a lot of electrical cables directly under that including this one that has been chopped at some point. Not by me!

Surely if it were live it would have already caused a problem, right? Especially since it surely got wet last night?
IMG20230801111730.jpg
 
Likely it will be a left-over old one, following on from a rewire, but the only way to be sure, is to test it with a known working tester - a meter, or a lamp, lamp-holder, and flex, connected temporarily with a choc block. Test and prove the tester works before and after your test, and isolate all power before opening up the old cable, only turn power on, during the actual test, and try turning on various switches.

If you confirm it as dead, it may be worth while, physically tracing it, and removing it, to avoid future confusion.
 
Can’t see properly from the photo but it looks like a round cable with a single core, outer cover coloured green.
If so, that may be an earth or bonding conductor. It may, or may not be needed, depending on the circumstances.
 
Yes, I should have posted a photo with an arrow or something. I'm wondering if the plumber cut it accidentally a couple of weeks ago because it is suspiciously close to where he cut a floorboard. But he had pulled the boards up to change the plumbing around first, so I don't know if that's what actually happened since he would have been able to see the cables.

I didn't know the cables for all the upstairs electricity went under the bathtub like that until the floorboards were pulled up.
 
Mander said:
I'm wondering if the plumber cut it accidentally a couple of weeks ago because it is suspiciously close to where he cut a floorboard.
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A clue might be - has anything stopped working, that worked before?

Seems unlikely, a plumber might cut a cable without noticing.
 
JohnW2 said:
Yes, it's obviously difficult to be sure, but I think that would be my 'best bet' (it certainly was my 'first impression') ...

.... but as for "green" ?? ;)

Kind Regards, John
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Well the colour rendition in the shadow isn't ideal and it certainly looks different on this laptop, quite creamy beige and not a million miles from a faded green/yellow, additionally the 'red' looks like a rust/mucky water stain. All in all I can well imagine it could easily look different again on another device, I still think it looks like twin shape though
Harry Bloomfield said:
A clue might be - has anything stopped working, that worked before?

Seems unlikely, a plumber might cut a cable without noticing.
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Looking again the 'chewed end' appears to line up with the edge of the floor board and the plumber certainly wouldn't have been the first to cut a cable while cutting off the tongue from T&G floorboards, especially if a reciprocating saw was used and power off at the time.

Of concern to me are the two cables in the foreground
1690973644192.png

The only time I've been aware of small writing like that has been on rubber insulation and these look black on this PC but grey on t'other.
 
Mander said:
Getting my bathroom redone has turned out to be a cursed project. Every few days something else goes wrong.

The new pipes that lead to the bath taps started leaking overnight, dripping through the ceiling below. Fortunately ? the floorboards are still partly up so I could see where the leak is. Conveniently there are a lot of electrical cables directly under that including this one that has been chopped at some point. Not by me!

Surely if it were live it would have already caused a problem, right? Especially since it surely got wet last night?
Click to expand...
Chopped floorboard? That end (in the first pic) looks as if he had the dog do it...and the cable in question looks to me like a bit of T & E that either a rat has been snacking on or it got in the way of a circular saw. Is there another similar looking raggy end under there? As others advised, isolate whole house, strip ends & make off with terminal block, test with a known working meter. Also have a look at your CU, see if any MCBs or RCDs have tripped.
 
It's in an awkward spot so hard to get a good photo but here's another try. Looks to me like red and black wires inside light grey insulation. It's about 1.5 cm wide altogether. I can't get my hand around the plumbing to get a look at the other side of the joist.

Everything seems to be working as it should. The power to this part of the house was off while he was working because of an issue with water leaking into a light fixture the previous day, but after I let it dry out I just flipped the switch on the consumer unit and everything came back on. It's been two weeks since he did this part of the work and we've been using all the outlets and lights as normal.

There's no evidence of any rodents.

IMG20230802190059.jpg
 
SUNRAY said:
these look black on this PC but grey on t'other.
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That one looks black to me in person. Is that a bad thing? I think it says "made in England to British standards".
 

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Mander said:
It's in an awkward spot so hard to get a good photo but here's another try. Looks to me like red and black wires inside light grey insulation. It's about 1.5 cm wide altogether.
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It looks as if that's either been (deliberately) cut very roughly or else accidentally cut with a saw or suchlike (as has been suggested). However, as has also been said, if the latter there would be 'the other bit' around somewhere. You obvioulsy have not seen any other cut cable yet (since you haven't mentioned it) , but is it possible that it's hiding from your sight because of ..
Mander said:
I can't get my hand around the plumbing to get a look at the other side of the joist.
Click to expand...
?

Kind \regards, John
 
Plastic twin and earth cable in the UK is normally white or grey. So a black sheath on this style of cable is indicative of old rubber cable. Which should have been removed from service years ago.

The problem is that existing cables are often not removed when rewiring. This leaves future people working on the property with a conundrum of whether a wire is disconnected and abandoned or whether it is still live and dangerous.
 
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