see our learners and today we're going to look at what to do with that consumer unit Joe what
we're going to do is going to make sure that all of the screw connections inside this consumer unit
I've done up to the correct torque setting okay to achieve that we're going to use our brand new Wiha
torque screwdriver pouch here which we've which we bought and we gonna use this to make sure that
every single one of these screws is done up to the correct torque setting why is it important that
we do that Gaz the manufacturers set the Newton meters of torque for both the earth bar neutral
bars the breakers and the main switch and we're required to return them to the required torque
setting according to the manufacturer and that the reason behind that is that we don't want excess
heat being generated by termination that could be loose and therefore maybe melt the insulation
possibly cause a fire but equally we don't want to over tighten them because you actually create
exactly the same problem yeah absolutely you can strip the threads on the screw and cause
the terminal to fail which is obviously very undesirable so I think we'll bring the camera in
we'll have a look at the Wiha pouch and we'll have a look at the consumer unit so Joe we've got the
Wiha pouched screwdriver set now open can you go through a few of the elements that are within that
set please yeah so we've got here the really nice Wiha kit we've got you'll notice two screwdriver
handles we've got just a normal screwdriver handle that we can change the head over on and
then we've also got the all-important and really quite expensive Wiha torque settings screwdriver
so this is the one that we're going to be using to set the torque settings on our terminals we've
also got the torque adjusting tool which actually helps us to change the torque setting on here and
we've got a variety of screwdriver heads we've got flats we've got Phillips and we've got pozi
but the one again we're gonna be using today the one we're really interested in are these here
we've got the slotted pozi screwdriver heads which are the ones that we should be using to
do up our terminals inside our consumer units and what's really nice about this kit is that you get
a pozi number 2 a slotted pozi number two and you also get the slightly smaller slotted pozi number
one so I'll have a little bit of a chat about how we're gonna use that in a moment okay then
Joe so we're ready to do up the terminations here for the top of the main switch we can
clearly see the tails are isolated and connected to anything so we're not obviously working live
and nor would we we're going to tighten these up to two point three Newton meters of torque first
of all we got to set up our Wiha screwdriver can you do that for us please yeah absolutely so what
we need to do is to set this to the right torque setting so in order to do that we need to remove
the screwdriver bit holder so that just simply pulls out of the handle quite easily like that
then we get our torque setting tool insert that into the end of the torque handle and then we
twist this round in this little tiny window here we can see what the torque setting will be so at
the moment we're going to crank this up to two point three Newton meters those two point two
we go beyond that the next one is two point four so what we need to do is go halfway between those
two it's not indicated that's two point three but it's halfway between two point two and two point
four so that's now set up and ready to go what we then need to do is put our screwdriver bit holder
back inside it's just making sure it's aligned properly and that will click back into the handle
select whichever screwdriver bit you're going to be using so in this case we're going to use
a slotted pozi number 2 pop that in the end of the screwdriver bit holder and then just slide
up this sleeve here and that locks the screwdriver bit into the holder so Joe screwdrivers ready at
two point three Newton meters of torque however before we check that they're at the right torque
set and what you're gonna do for me please well this might seem a little bit counterintuitive
to our viewers but we're actually just going to undo the screws ervices slightly these tails have
been put in and tightened up and before I set them to the right torque setting because this
hasn't been done with the torque screwdriver yet I just want to make sure that they're not
all the way tight the reason for that is that when we select the correct torque setting and
do these up to the right value we're making sure that we're not leaving them too loose but we're
also not making sure that we're doing them up too tight now if somebody had done these up and
appositely hauled on the screw and really got it cranked right up really tight when I come
to put my torque setting screwdriver onto there what's going to happen is that it's just simply
going to register the correct torque setting even though it might be up to 2.5 2.7 even 3
Newton meters they could already be done up to tight so by selecting them off slightly in the
first place when I retighten it now I know exactly that I'm getting 2.3 Newton meters so let's just
make sure that these are done up to the right value so there's 2.3 Newton meters and again
and again last one so now each one of those screws is done up to the torque setting as recommended by
the manufacturer so that's the main switch done Joe now we've got the RCD within the consumer
unit what we do now so we need to make sure that the manufacturers connections are tight as well
that's always a good recommendation so we're going to make sure here that we've got the right torque
setting and again these are 2.3 Newton meters according to the manufacturers literature so once
again just going to make sure that these are at the correct torque setting by selecting them off
a little bit and then just tighten them up to the right value so again we'll just slacking it off
a little bit and then tighten it up to the right value and you can see this is not a particularly
onerous job this is not taking off a lot of time we've just done the main incoming tails and it's
the matter of just a few seconds just to make sure that these are all to the correct value obviously
make sure that we conductors don't fall out of the terminal make sure that they're still in
there securely and you're doing the bottom of the RCD at the moment as well yeah absolutely
yeah in fact actually that one was a little bit loose so it's a good job that we are checking
these and again just slack enough ever such a bit and tighten up and then again slacking off
a little bit and tighten up so again within the space of about 30 seconds we've made sure that
all of the manufacturer's terminals are at the correct setting as well which is quite useful
so Joe as we've got it set to two point three Newton meters of torque I think it's worth doing
the top of the circuit breakers now at the same time before we have to change the torque settings
for the earth and neutral bars yeah that gives us a little bit of efficiency of time doesn't it
so again these have already been tightened up so we're just slacking them off just a little
bit and then it will set them up to the right value so that's now at the right value we've
got a spare way there so we won't worry about that one there we go just loosen them off to
do it ever so slightly and then make sure that the torque setting is correct and again this is
one of those things that when you do it doesn't take very long and you've got the peace of mind
of knowing that you've got every single connection inside this board at the right value so there we
go that's the top row done so that's every single MCB set to the correct value and again we just go
along the bottom and make sure that we've got the bus bar on the right setting and well Luke
Whichard did a beautiful video for sort of part of the video that he did for connecting this up
where he actually shows us how to make sure that the bar in the bottom of the circuit breakers is
obviously connected correctly might be one worth watching each other viewers can click
an item we're good well hope so yep so this is thought you said non-owner estas just a couple
of minutes just to confirm these are all back to the manufacturer's Newton meters of torque yep
and for me this is a very reassuring thing so is used to check and double-check all my connections
and make sure that all of my terminals were done to the correct values and having this bit of kit
just to make sure that that's all done for you is really reassuring so we're almost there Joe
we just got to do the earth and neutral bars next and that is 1.7 Newton meters of torque
so you can just quickly show us how to reset that to that value absolutely so again we just slipped
the screwdriver bit holder out of the end there pop in our torque setting bar and we crank this
down now to 1.7 which again is somewhere between 1.8 and 1.6 so it'll be about this we'll make
sure that that's correct and then what we do is we simply pop the screwdriver a bit holder back
inside now what we're going to do here is when we look at these screws along the top bars here
along the earth in the neutral bars the screw heads look slightly smaller and when we plunk
this screwdriver in here it doesn't look like it quite sits properly inside those screws so what
I'm gonna do and what you should really do is when you're doing up all of these types of connection
is make sure that the screwdriver head actually matches up with the terminal and I think on this
particular one the way I look at it that these screws need to be done up with a pozi number one
because the pozi number two just doesn't seem to quite grip inside there quite as well as it
could do so by using the pozi number one we get a slightly better contact and again we can go along
and make sure that all of these are done up to the correct tightness so again just a slight slacking
enough and then retighten them to the correct value I mean you say that's a positive one that's
a slotted pozi one it's the one designed to go in this style of screws is that right Joe that's
correct yep sometimes these are referred to as plus/minus is so again slackening off tightening
up 1.7 Newton meters of torque as required by the manufacturer it's exactly the same for the earth
bars is the neutral bar Joe is working his way down absolutely and you'll notice as I've gone
along as well again I've checked the manufacturers connections on this bar to the correct torque
setting as well and we're approaching the end of the CPC's now I know there's a bit call that you
allow the connections Joe to settle down maybe you give them a little pull in a tug and then
you revisit these termination tightness again that's electricians preference I think we are
trying to reiterate the point of setting it to the required torque saying and if you want to go back
afterwards just to give them that final tweak I think you would wouldn't be bad practice to do so
and then we go in that to earth conduct there was not as tight as it could have been so we made that
right up to the correct tightness now so again you know we've done an introduction we've tightened up
all of these connections and all in all that has not been a very long task and we've got the peace
of mind now of knowing that all of these terminals are there not to the correct torque setting so Joe
we're gonna revisit this consumer unit a few more times in the future we're going to talk about AC
RCDs and A-type RCDs and the pros and cons of using each of those we're also going to look
Joe this stickers some of the stickers that we're gonna have to put on the consumer unit before we
leave this video concentrate on Joe this company I concentrated on making sure that we've got the
right torque setting on all of the terminals inside here so every single one of these screws
now he's done up to the manufacturers recommended setting we also worked between the slotted pozi 2
and the slotted pozi one depending on where we were on the earth by at neutral bar or actually
an absolute 8 and again this is one of those things you've got to look at the screw head
and match it up to the screwdriver bit yeah and make a judgment call on what do you think it's
going to be a number two or whether you think it's going to be a number one just make sure you get
that absolutely spot-on so I think it's time Joe through it we hope this video has been some help