The Importance of Cable Marking
It is essential to take care when undertaking such activities as wiring as essential guidelines need to be established beforehand. One of these integral things is cable marking. Colour coding, the most common and identifiable method, helps avoid a possible mixing up of circuits which could cause great damage. It also highlights individual functions so when wiring is tested and repaired it can be identified separating earth and neutral conductors.
The reason why cable marking is so important is for the purposes of identification. If, when wiring, the conductors are unidentifiable then problems may emerge. This may include a wrong wire fitting that would affect the whole installation, but also they are a health and safety issue in that some may be more harmful than others and connected in the wrong way may be dangerous.
Cable marking should be both legible and clear. If they are neither legible nor clear then there is the possibility that wiring could go wrong and injure someone if the wrong wires are connected. This is common in terms of complicated installations where conductors remain unidentified by wiring arrangement, an example is with distribution boards where earth bars and neutral bars remain unidentified and this could cause problems when wiring. Therefore the key to cable marking is making sure that there is a difference in identifying earth and neutral conductors.
There are also products available that can further help identification. These include sleeves, which can help with identification even when disconnected from terminals, stainless steel markers have smooth edges and so can easily help cable insulation and compute printable products help, some of which simply tie on. These can be marked with such important information to help identify earth, neutral, material and list hazards. This shows the importance of identification, especially when wiring is going on, as it an important job and can have terrible consequences if something goes wrong.
Many companies are selling different types of cable marking products. Many offer cable marking printers, which are hand held, self-adhesive cable marking, which is transparent and can mark particularly awkward objects, cable marking write on dispensers, which are fast and convenient, cable marking heat shrink tubes, which provide perfect insulation, and colour coding cable marking tape, which safely insulates electrical products.
There seems no end to multipurpose cable marking. This is further emphasised by the importance in identifying key conductors, and the methods in which this is done. Even with buried cables, marks on metal posts help them to be identified as well as arrows indicating cables location, with some products. Although, for buried cables there are rules. These include labels being within two feet of the buried cable. This emphasises further the need to identify cables, especially when the cables themselves cannot be identified because they are obscured or buried from view.
For wiring to be a safe and successful, exercise cable marking needs to be done and there are several methods by which this can be achieved. By colour coding and marking where the cable is, efficient identification and safe wiring can take place. Cables without marking are unidentifiable, and therefore dangerous.
Author Bio: Neweys Online offers a range of products from cable management to lighting peripherals such as lighting peripherals and other cable products and accessories such as square d rcbo and mem consumer unit
Category: Home Management
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