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On 28/09/2025 23:19, Roger Hayter wrote:
Some of my house wiring uses 2.5mm T&E with what looks like white PVC outer >> sheathing and (red and black) rubber covering the conductors. The rubber seems
quite elastic, not apparently hardened or splitting. Is it reasonable to leave
this in place?
PVC outer with rubber insulated conductors is rare, but did exist. It is
old, usually imperial sizes and typically stranded. It will probably be
in better condition than fully rubber insulated cable.
(I'm going to anyway, just wondering how reasonable I'm being.)
Well it *could* still be safe. You would need to inspect carefully - especially at the termination points.
Old T&E may only have a 1mm^2 CPC/Earth (if it has one at all). That
means that a spur on a socket ring circuit may not have adequate fault protection if the circuit is fed from a BS3036 re-wireable fuse but it
is probably ok on a MCB.
I really don't know if it is some Imperial size, but it looks like 2.5mm. And the insulation is indisputably rubber rather than PVC, though quite possibly some sort of synthetic rubber.
Roger Hayter <roger@hayter.org> wrote:
I really don't know if it is some Imperial size, but it looks like 2.5mm. And
the insulation is indisputably rubber rather than PVC, though quite possibly >> some sort of synthetic rubber.
A white outer is nowadays sometimes a sign of it being LSZH (low smoke zero halogen) cable which is more fireproof than regular PVC. It uses XLPE
inners rather than PVC which can be more stretchy - maybe that's what you're seeing?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xE_EVnasj7Y
shows stripping some modern cable. (They're using Doncaster Cables' product which has a groove down the middle; other manufacturers don't)
Theo