Electrical Lubricants
What’s lube got to do with it?
Brett Smyth, general manager of Ideal Industries EMEA, the global leader in electrical accessories, tools and equipment, discusses why the growing trend towards conduit is creating opportunities for electrical wholesalers in specialist lubricants.
S
ay the word ‘lube’ at many electrical wholesalers and you might expect the odd schoolboy snigger, along with a few blank looks from industry professionals who have never really come across the electrical lubricants category. But for some types of installations, selecting the right electrical lubricant is just as essential as installing the right cable.
At IDEAL Industries, we are global leaders in electrical lubricants, selling large volumes of our products, including Yellow 77, Clearglide and Aqua- Gel II. Until recently, the large volumes of lubricants we were selling in the US and the Middle East dwarfed the UK market, where the moderate climate and reduced use of conduit meant that lube was often not only unnecessary, but not even considered. But installation trends are changing and the use of conduit in electrical installations has been growing. There has been no ground-breaking innovation in the world of conduit design or fabrication, but the amount of conduit used to protect cables in
30 | electrical wholesaler July 2022
commercial and domestic interiors is increasing nonetheless. And where there is cable being installed in conduit, there is a risk of friction that could damage the cables and a need to pull them through the conduit smoothly; that’s where selecting the right lube comes in.
The move towards conduit Increased use of conduit brings the UK into line with common electrical sector working practices in other countries, such as the USA, for example, where conduit is a fairly standard element of any electrical network installation. In the UK, where we benefit from some of the strictest quality and safety standards across all construction disciplines, the need for conduit has been avoided due to the straight, linear runs typical of wiring installations, which make it easy to predict the route of electric cables from the location of sockets and light fittings. However, the added protection provided by conduit has led to more widespread use, particularly in retrofit installations.
According to current wiring regulations, where a cable is concealed in a wall or partition at depth of less than 50mm it must be enclosed in earthed metal capping or conduit (trunking) or installed in zones either horizontally within 150mm of the top of the wall or vertically to the wiring accessory or consumer
ewnews.co.uk
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