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I’ve also seen currently valid PAT stickers on equipment with faults like improperly secured mains cables, both at the equipment end and the mains plug end.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Mind you a PAT test is better than the old days when it was I’ve plugged it in and the breakers have held, there’s no blue smoke and I can touch it without dying so must be safe!
I suppose you can't be too careful!
I do our PAT.
The last gig we did at an hotel than require PAT, only one of the 4 mains sockets in the room we were playing worked!!
Or they put us in a marquee in the grounds of a hotel in the pissing rain....
The last one who demanded a PAT certificate off us had a stupidly sensitive decibel meter cutting the power when the bass drum was played acoustically.
I refused, on the basis that any venue with a potentially equipment-damaging intermittent power supply had no right to make demands on us. Eventually they ran us an (untested) extension lead from a back office.
We turned everything down and started playing, and then one of the bar staff came up to me and said we couldn't use the drums.
It was a slightly Abbott and Costello exchange.
Barman: "You can't play the drums."
Me: "That's right I can't play the drums."
Barman:"No, you can't play the drums."
Me: "I told you, I can't play the drums."
Barman:"No, you can't play the drums tonight."
Me: "I'm not playing the drums tonight, I'm playing the guitar."
Barman:"No, your drummer can't play the drums".
Me:"I think that's a bit harsh."
etc etc.
In the end we ended up doing the gig with the drummer playing with brushes with the snare and hats only.
My life would be far less irritating if I could avoid the Internet.
Trading feedback here
You'll need a tester, which should be calibrated every year (this costs me around 50 pounds).
The test set would need to be able to test Class I (chassis grounded, eg amps), Class II (ungrounded, eg low voltage PSUs for effects / keyboards) and mains leads.
Basic testers start from around 250 pounds.
You would also need to prove you are a "competent person". If you work in a related industry then you would be deemed a "competent person", however if you don't you would probably need to take a course. I've not looked into this, but is suspect it would be a few hundred pounds.
Whether this saves you money with depend on how much you already send on PAT.
Shame, because this would be one of the few cases where my dusty old BEng in Electroacoustics would have actually come in handy!
Trading feedback here