Mother-in-law phoned last night to say her telly had conked out, no red light or anything, not a sausage. She's had both her hips replaced so couldn't get down to check the plug, her cat likes to play with the cables & I thought that he'd pulled the plug out, said I'd sort it tomorrow. 10 mins later she phoned to say it had started working again, then a bit later to say it had conked again, then later back on..
Got there today & the TV had conked out again, not a sausage from it. Noticed TV & hard disc recorder were plugged in to one of those remote controlled plug bars, felt the bar & it was very hot, some of it had gone brown. Plugged TV direct into socket & it worked perfect. Found another normal plug bar & both TV & hard disc are now working OK... I'm wondering if the remote controlled plug bar had overheated & a thermal cutout had shut it down, then later when it cooled reconnected & so on? Needless to say it's for the bin..