Pat 60 floods and PAT testing

[richard]

Hello

My uncle is having an issue in a school where he does some am-dram where the electricians are failing the old Pat 60 floods due to the lack of a grill covering the lamps. His view (which I agree with) is that no grill is required on this type of unit as they are not at risk of exploding (not being halogen)

Does anyone know if this is the case and whether there is any documentation around about it?

Thanks

Richard

[sandall]

Seems logical (I don't think Mrs sandall would be impressed if I covered our remaining BC lamps with wire mesh), but who can tell what a PAT-monkey might decide to fail - nobody is ever going to be prosecuted for failing something that is safe. 

[Junior8]

Of course there is no need for a grill but it all depends if your uncle wants to continue banging his head against the wall of such stupidity. He could, for what it's worth, show them the data sheet https://www.theatrecrafts.com/archive/documents/patt60_instructions.pdf and ask them to identify the part number of said grill from the list. 

[J Pearce]

Oh dear, the school will have to appeal to the H&S committtee for funding to replace the incredibly dangerous lights with modern LED equivalents 😉

Or - point out any pendant lightbulb anywhere - especially those hipster octopus spaghetti ones...

[themadhippy]

Id throw it back at the so called "electrician" and ask them to provide  the documentation that deems them a fail

[adam2]

I would prefer that the front of a patt. 60 be enclosed in metal mesh, but that is my personal view of good practice and not a regulatory requirement.

High wattage GLS lamps CAN explode, and in so doing they produce more debris than a d0m3stic wattage lamp. I suspect that the risk of such explosions is increasing as such lamps fall out of favour for general lighting. They are becoming rather a specialty product, produced in small numbers by unknown makers, and probably no longer include fuses.

I can remember the days when high wattage GLS lamps were widely used for industrial lighting, and almost always in open fixtures. The risks were less in those days for several reasons, firstly a lot of lamps were lower voltage, such as 110/120 volt in series pairs, or 50 volt lamps. Secondly the lamps almost certainly contained fuses. And slightly lower standards were accepted in those distant days.

If the lanterns still have colour frames, what about inserting clear heat shield gel when open white is needed ? Or fine steel mesh such as chicken wire.

[ianknight]

14 hours ago, richard said:

Hello

My uncle is having an issue in a school where he does some am-dram where the electricians are failing the old Pat 60 floods due to the lack of a grill covering the lamps. His view (which I agree with) is that no grill is required on this type of unit as they are not at risk of exploding (not being halogen)

Does anyone know if this is the case and whether there is any documentation around about it?

Thanks

Richard

But most basically... Are the lanterns electrically safe & do they pass test?

The Portable Appliance Test is there to ensure the electrical safety of items not to question the physical design of items but as always, the school appears to have employed the lowest price quote for PAT testing instead of a "specialist" in theatre equipment. It would be fun to ask the tester (if they used ladders) why they used metal ladders or scaffold tower to access the kit - always good for seeing someone who's only read the CoP or done a webinar on PAT testing squirm. 

I once saw a "reputable" electrical contractors wrapping a set of aluminium steps in cling film (with an apprentice on standby in speedo's) to place them in a therapeutic pool in a special school to replace some fluroescent tubes "Because the school won't drain the pool or pay for scaffolders to board over it for the work..."

If the tester is vexed enough by lack of mesh then he/she should make a note/comment on the final report that a new risk assessment should be considered & leave it there (PAT testing is now very much "risk based" too) but if the lantern passes it's electrical tests then its "passed". 

It's also worth noting that a FaceBook group I belong to for PAT testers gets very vexed about items that aren't CE marked or BS marked - the Patt 60 would confound them on both counts (as would most lanterns older than about 20 years old!)

The primary consideration is "Will the unit give anyone an electrical shock if touched or cause a fire if the wiring fails?" surely? If the school is really concerned then it's for them to control the risk - possibly by leaving a gel frame fitted with some Lee 159 (so they look "open" but the gel will catch debris in the unlikely event of a lamp exploding - which by the way I've never seen happen in 40 odd years!).

The moral is - talk to a specialist, not the cheapest...

[Dave m]

I have never seen one explode either.

agree, PAT is electrical only, it could be covered in razor blades and pass PAT, and I suppose hung with a 5p cable tie.

[ianknight]

10 minutes ago, Dave m said:

agree, PAT is electrical only, it could be covered in razor blades and pass PAT, and I suppose hung with a 5p cable tie.

The eternal debate...

I had many energetic debates with a previous employer who insisted we should "fail" any items with a safety chain & not a wire bond (and the occasional one without any secondary suspension, we just refused to rehang them after testing) - eventually we agreed to disagree and included a strongly worded recommendation that the chains should be replaced with properly marked & rated bonds. :P

[adam2]

I can not agree that PAT testing is ONLY about electrical safety. It should also include a basic inspection for other hazards.

Should a desk fan be passed as safe to use without an enclosure that prevents touching the blades ? Not in my view.

Should a heater be passed with an exposed red hot element, again not in my view.

[Dave m]

agree it's a stupid thing to declare something obviously unsafe as "safe" but PAT has rules to follow and pass/fail.

Just because it passes PAT does not mean it's "safe" but other considerations to do with H&S should then be considered.

a vehicle cannot fail an MOT if every test complies, even if there's an open vat of acid on the passenger seat

[Robertdazzler]

I well remember in my youth over-tightening the GES lamp in a simple Patt 60 type lantern with the result of the lamp coming away from its cap at power up (this could be deemed an explosion). Any medium in the filter frame would have saved debris falling out. Today modern rules require that access to live parts requires a tool - not mentioned and also no mention of asbestos leads which may also be present depending on the age of the lantern. Theatre electrics is indeed a specialist subject and not always fully understood by regular electricians. 

[Don Allen]

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news ? But I had a callout to a public secondary college, the glass "bulb" section of a Patt60 lamp had fallen from the lighting grid, narrowly missing a student, it broke on the carpet, leaving glass fragment in the carpet. There was no colour frame on the Patt60 to stop the glass "bulb" falling out. It left the metal screw base of the lamp still in the lamp base and two pieces of lamp filament sticking up with 240V potential across them.  Out of reach to noram users, but these students had easy access to scaffold for focussing.

Our risk assessment was that it could occur again, so I went to our local hardware store, got some large open black coated mesh and made mesh guards for the Patt 60 and Patt 137. Duty of care satisfied. (I do not like H&S fanatics either but this was common sense.)

[richard]

Thanks all - useful information..

[Ynot]

I'll add my 10p to the forehead slapping posts here - I've mentioned here a while back about another school I've done a few shows at where their PAT tester failed PAR cans which had no safeties, or had the old ceramic lamp holders... The latter on the basis that 'students could get their fingers burned if they stuck them in the back of the lanterns - but seeing as I was being brought in to light their shows because the students weren't allowed to do anything with LX, that much was moot anyway!

Yes - PAT is and should be all about electrical testing and safety. There MAY be other hazards identified during testing, and of course if they are REAL hazards - and not just something an experienced tech should be able to recognise and mitigate, esp if it is part of a standard MOU - then they could/should be noted, and then it's up to the responsible adults in the room to RA the question and deal accordingly.