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Plug vs. Plug — Which Nation's Socket Is Best?
CNETNate writes "Is the American mains socket really so much worse than the Italian design? And does the Italian socket fail at rivaling the sockets in British homes? This feature explores, in a not-at-all-parodic-and-anecdotal fashion, the designs, strengths and weaknesses of Earth's mains adapters. There is only one conclusion, and you're likely not to agree if you live in France. Or Italy. Or in fact most places." (For more plug pics and details, check out Wikipedia's list of the ones in current use.)
8 fucking pages with two small paragraphs on each page? fuck. off.
There already is an international standard. The problem is that no one is going to invest a ton of money to scrap their current system (pun?) and switch over to it.
http://gizmodo.com/5391271/giz-explains-why-every-country-has-a-different-fing-plug
I did not agree with the tiny 10-page article that barely had enough substance for 1 physical paper.
It's worse than that. I hate to spoil the ending for you but he comes to the conclusion that the British outlet is the greatest with a 10 out of 10 score. Why? Safety features. Features like shuttering and built in fuses. Both of which are optional on American outlets as well -- I'm sure -- as they are on outlets around the world. Maybe they're standard in the UK but they're optional in the US. I'd rather have the option than even more regulation. Also, the picture for the US is ungrounded. I'm beginning to think this article was written by someone who's never really cared to understand the diversity of plugs in countries other than his own (which I would never use in the US and very rarely see). Nationalistic garbage is about all this amounts to. Yawn.
My work here is dung.
UK plugs are about double the size, have significantly thicker pins and have a fuse built in.
Other than that, identical.
They also completely failed to mention sheer size. British mains plugs are fucking enormous. That might be fine for AC blowers and electric kettles, which are big anyway and draw a fair bit of current; but it is annoying and ridiculous for the ever growing crop of little tiny switchmode adapters that power the gizmos and gadgets of modern life.
As a British person living in the USA I notice that the majority of my sockets outside kitchen and bathroom are not GFI protected (either at the socket or the fuse panel) and that most appliances do not use an Earth Pin.
I also am in awe that socket adapters are legally sold that convert non earthed sockets into earthed sockets and light bulb sockets into earthed sockets, the safety implications are huge. I think it is a fair assessment to use 110V non earth sockets as many home have them.
I also notice that no appliance I own in the USA uses insulation on the live pins of the plug to prevent accidental shocks when the plug is slightly out of the socket, none of the sockets contain safety shutters and that 110V cords to high wattage appliances such as vacuum cleaners get warm and the lights change brightness when I switch such appliances on and off. IMO the British home electrical system is much better than the USA system and I have tried to view it impartially over the years.
and the plastic guards across the power pin sockets that only open when the earth pin is inserted.. prevents little fingers etc.
oh, and they always (almost always, not on really old sockets) have a switch next to each socket so you can turn them on/off.
Oh yes, that switch, the fuse in the plug and the protective plastic cover over the live socket must add something like 1p to each socket in whatever Chinese prison they're being made in this week. Sure, they last forever and save lives, but it's just too much of an expense for me.
And they leak oil.
Man up.
If you can't handle a bit of unprotected metal carrying 110V and fake grounded adaptors you're not cut out for this continent.
If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
Yay, I've above average!
Min-Kyu Choi's Folding UK style plug. All the goodness of the UK plug, none of the bulky crap. http://www.minkyu.co.uk/Site/Product/Entries/2009/4/20_Folding_Plug_System.html
The British people are strangely proud of the ungainly BS 1363 plug. No surprise at all that it won the comparison.
What is it with the Americans on here? The British people are not proud of their plugs, the British people take plugs for granted. It's not like there was a national vote on what plugs to use or anything.
To warp this into a issue of national pride is just wrong.
I was going to just copy and paste in my older post titled "The UK plug is the nanny state run wild", but I can't find the damned thing.
The simple fact of the matter is that the pins on the US plug are so short that by the point it is far enough out of the socket to expose enough of the pins to touch them with your fingers, it's unplugged. No partially insulated pins or other wacky design contrivances are needed.
The UK plug appears to have originally been designed by someone who was laboring under the misunderstanding that they were designing a connector for welding equipment, not domestic appliances. It can safely carry 100A of current, if you replace the fuse with a solid link. Why? The plug contains a maximum 13A fuse and the ring main circuit in a UK home is limited to about 40A if I remember correctly. Why a 100A connector when it can only ever be supplied with 40A?
Shutters on the sockets are a very recent development in the US, and a probably just being copied from the UK for no other reason than shutter envy. There's no real demand for them, because Americans are somehow able to resist the temptation that apparently so often overcomes their British counterparts to stick things in the socket other than a plug.
When my family moved from the UK to the USA back in 1982, I thought the US plug was flimsy compared to the UK plugs I was used to. But, really, a Honda Civic looks flimsy compared to a Caterpillar bulldozer, but I know which one I'd buy to drive every day. (Yes, I have to get a car analogy in.)
A major advantage of the USA plug is that it's smaller - you can plug six appliances into a power strip and not have the power strip be the size of a house. If you have a laptop bag, the USA plug isn't some great big lump in the bag. The US plug is designed for its intended use, not designed to be safe even if being used by newborn babies to plug in their industrial welding equipment.
You might say, well, the US plug can't carry as much current for heavy loads. It's true that you can't get as much power through a single US plug as you can through a UK 13A plug, but that's because the voltage is higher. The US plug can carry 15A at 125V all day long. My wire feed welder works just fine plugged into a normal US 15A outlet - the plug doesn't even get warm.
Putting moderation advice in your
They do have the convenient habit of only coming in "flat surface mount" variety though, so the cord is already against the wall. Or at least, the cord sticks no further from the wall than the plug itself does. Most US plus for some reason think it is a great idea to stick far further out from the wall than even the huge British plug due to plugging in perpendicular. You can get the smaller "flush mount" plugs for some things in the US (usually extension cords, sometimes computer power cables) but they're then next to impossible to remove because they become so flat (a bonus for the larger British plug).
I also don't recall the British plugs having the "plug falls out of the wall due to the weight of the cord" problem that FAR TOO MANY US sockets do. It could just be the house we lived in when we were in England had new enough sockets that wasn't a problem -- I don't know for sure. I do know I've experienced the plug-falls-out problem in many, many houses and apartments in the US.
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Having lived in the US, UK, Malaysia and France, I would concurr that the British plug system is far better. It was properly thought, and universally implemented across the country 50 years ago using an act of parliment on the premise that using anything else was dangerous and therefore potentially negligent. More features have been added since then (including household earth-leakage trip sensing).
I've had problems with a French pin snapping in a socket leaving an exposed live pin for my 3-year-old son to play with (luckily I spotted it in time and managed to cover it).
In the US I almost got used to the risk of shocks off electrical appliances. I also had a lab fire destroy some of my work because somebody had knocked out the cable of the pump supplying the coolant.
In Malaysia where the national standard specifies the british plug type, the biggest issue was that cheap Chinese imports sometimes didn't use it.
When basic safety is involved, I don't think that it's over-engineering. Your comment about extra points of failure doesn't make any sense.
The falling out of the wall problem isn't the most alarming issue with US plugs. The falling slightly out, just far enough that the connection is still (poorly) made and you get sparks flying when you turn the device on problem is. How anyone could defend this design is beyond me.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I think you fail to understand the difference between a fuse and a surge protector. A fuse protects from over current only. It offers very limited protection for over voltage. A surge as you're describing comes from a sharp increase in voltage (from 120 to several hundred or thousand volts). A surge protector typically defeats a surge via a zener diode (One that only lets current flow if the voltage is over a threashold) shorted to ground. So if the voltage rises above the clamping voltage, all current is redirected to ground.
This also differs from a GFCI in operation. A GFCI detects ground faults. That means current leaking from the primary to the ground pin. In normal operation, this shouldn't happen. But if a circuit is shorted, or becomes damaged, the ground (which is usually connected to the chasis on metal items) can be connected to the primary lead. So the GFCI detects this leakage, and kills power. Surge protectors, GCFI and fuses are very different systems, each designed to protect from a specific hazard.
Now, a circuit breaker is a fuse. Their very nature only protects against excess current only. There are two important differences however. A breaker is a lot faster at disconnecting current than a fuse (it's designed to be fast), and it's resettable. So to say that the UK version is better because it has a fuse shows me a lack of understanding of practicality or safety. Fuses are designed to protect the wiring. That's it. Nothing else. A fuse prevents a short circuit from melting the wiring in the house and causing a fire. With the excess current required to trip a fuse, the damage to the equipment is likely damaged already. And it will be more than enough current to kill a person (It only takes about 0.015 amps to kill someone, regardless of voltage).
If a man isn't willing to take some risk for his opinions, either his opinions are no good or he's no good
As an electrician, all i can say is when I get nailed with 120v I give the wire a dirty look and when I get it from 240v I say #$%@#^%.
Lone Dragon
It'll quit hurtin' once the pain stops.
Technically, the IEC power connector, as found on the back of most computers, is one of the best. You usually see a chassis-mount IEC male connector and a cord-mount female connector, but the reverse forms are available. IEC "wall sockets" are sometimes found in rackmount server outlet strips. The plug is shrouded, and the socket has an enclosing slot for the shroud, so at no time are energized pins exposed. The shroud engages the enclosing slot before the pins make contact. That's a key safety feature. It allows a smaller plug; if exposed pins are energized while the plug is being plugged in, the plug has to be made larger to keep fingers away from the pins.
IEC is a flat-pin design, which is good. Getting a large contact area on round pins is hard, so round-pin connectors of a given size usually carry less current. Flat-pin contacts just slide between two flat spring-loaded blades, which can accommodate wear on both surfaces. The split-cylinder contacts of round-pin female connectors have to match closely, so as they wear, the inside radius of the cylinder increases and no longer properly matches the pin. Round pins vs. flat contact blades are sometimes used; they wear better, but the the contact area is small.
The older round-pin European connectors are only rated for 10A, sometimes only 7.5A. At 240V, this is adequate. IEC connectors are rated for 15A, and there's a 20A form.
Today we expect connectors to just work, but it took considerable engineering to get to that point. As late as 1980, computers had serious problems with connector unreliability.
He's American.
Your sad devotion to those ancient electrical plugs hasn't given you clairvoyance enough to stop the Nazis from bombing your cities or helped you conjure up the stolen data tapes.
Hokey fuses and ancient plug designs are no match for a good American socket in your wall, kid.
If this is a news site for nerds, then why is this a flamewar about A/C plugs? Commander! Tear this site apart until you've found some nerds. And bring me the women, I want them alive!
Unfortunately, you'd be wrong on both accounts.
First of all, current kills, not potential difference (=voltage). Both 110 and 220V are plenty to overcome the resistance of the human body so from that perspective there's hardly a difference.
Secondly, many appliances can *really* do with 220V (actually, it's even 230V). For example: tumble dryer, oven (electrical), washing machine, dish washer, electrical stoves and basically anything that needs to heat water. Nearly all of those are manufactured to draw about 2000-2500W maximum, which makes for a current of about 10A (at 230V). Ovens and stoves may even draw much more - induction stoves can often draw about 7000W. Good luck doing that at 110V...
Every expression is true, for a given value of 'true'