Working - dead or live: Isolation is paramount when repairing or adding to industrial circuits - if you haven't got the time, think about the alternative

摘要

This ought to be the shortest article in any issue of Electrical Connection, for the simple reason that no work should be done on live installations. That's how the various State and Territory authorities (often WorkCover) see it. However, working live is impossible to avoid in practice. As the regulations of Queensland point out, testing an installation - for example, whether voltage is present at a particular point - exposes you to the risk of contacting live conductors or apparatus. Only the simple domestic installation is easily isolated. For obvious reasons, there is usually no realistic opportunity to do so with industrial and commercial installations. Without describing each pertinent State and Territory regulation, we'll take the Victorian one as being typical.