{"id":504,"date":"2006-06-28T09:10:27","date_gmt":"2006-06-28T09:10:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/archives\/2006\/06\/28\/fun-with-dodgy-wiring\/"},"modified":"2006-06-28T09:10:27","modified_gmt":"2006-06-28T09:10:27","slug":"fun-with-dodgy-wiring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/archives\/2006\/06\/28\/fun-with-dodgy-wiring\/","title":{"rendered":"Fun with dodgy wiring"},"content":{"rendered":"

I arrived at work this morning to find that although there was electricity (for a change) the network wasn’t working. A quick look in the server room revealed that the router was off.<\/p>\n

The wiring led back to one of the usual dubious Chinese multi-way adaptors (called ‘multisockets’ here), I waggled the plugs in case it was a bad connection (quite common with those) but still no power. \u00a0I then tried waggling the multisocket’s plug and was rewarded with the power coming on briefly and some sparks.<\/p>\n

When I pulled out the plug I got this:
\n\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

The plug (of course) has no fuse and very thin wires soldered directly to the top of the pins.
\n<\/p>\n

As the server room contains only one socket (already in use) this caused a bit of a problem and I had to go back to my house to fetch some of my own plugs and a decent multisocket (brought from the UK). I then spent an hour or so replacing plugs and fuses and rewiring. This will have to do until I manage to get the electricians to fix it properly.<\/p>\n

This kind of thing happens a lot in Nigeria, we’re lucky the melting plug didn’t start a fire and burn the building down, as happens to quite a few homes and offices every year in Nigeria. As a final insult these low-quality electrical products are usually covered in UK flags and “British Standard” labels (the faulty plug has a UK flag on the other side). It would actually be illegal to sell these things in the UK!
\n\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

I’m going to have to watch the electricians carefully when they come to fix the server room too. In Nigeria you seem to be regarded as a qualified electrician just because you have a screwdriver that lights up, there doesn’t seem to be any training.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I arrived at work this morning to find that although there was electricity (for a change) the network wasn’t working. A quick look in the server room revealed that the router was off. The wiring led back to one of the usual dubious Chinese multi-way adaptors (called ‘multisockets’ here), I waggled the plugs in case […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech","category-vso"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.caboose.org.uk\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}