What is the best Power Outlet, and why?
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Fusing plugs is completely unnecessary. The only reason this is done in the UK is because of old janky circuits only used in the UK.
So still necessary in the UK
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USB. Most things don’t need AC power. We can get rid of wall warts and create a universal standard by including USB C ports on AC plugs.
On my way to power my fridge and oven by usb-c!
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So is the shutter system. Blocking contacts unless a third is pushed in is great safety, particularly with kids.
And having your chargers look like clown shoes compared to the slender 2-pin chargers used in Europe, Australia and elsewhere is a small price to pay.
Do more kids really die of electrocution in, say, France or Germany than the UK?
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A useful source:
https://worldofsockets.comOh, a list of things each identified by a different letter, better put them in a completely random order.
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South Africa is also slowly adopting Type-N.
Europe was supposed to, but abandoned the idea
Interesting. How far along is South Africa’s adoption of it? Are they appearing in newly built houses or on appliances? And how are they handling the transition?
If 2-pin Europlugs won’t fit into a Type N, Europe may be better off in adopting the Swiss variant (which they do fit).
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When did type N become common?
It became mandatory for all new products in 2011, so a few years after that most people were used to it, though there's many people still using adapters to this day.
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why would you shove things into it's mouth?
I think shoving things into its eyes is more concerning
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Interesting. How far along is South Africa’s adoption of it? Are they appearing in newly built houses or on appliances? And how are they handling the transition?
If 2-pin Europlugs won’t fit into a Type N, Europe may be better off in adopting the Swiss variant (which they do fit).
South Africa used to use a Mixture of M and C, and still mostly do.
But since 2018 building regulations require new houses to have at least one Type N plug installed.
Adoption is slow, but N being compatible with C will hopefully speed things along. -
A useful source:
https://worldofsockets.comThis diagram doesn’t do the utter goofiness of type M justice.
Here are a few styles you will come across.
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Easy. Type G. For safety. If you're worried about night-time attacks from ninja you can leave a few plugs by your bedroom door and windows with the pins upward. They will rue the day they entered that room in the dark!
Type G. For safety.
G
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The actual electrical device can be designed such that it depends on exactly which direction is live and which is neutral.
Imagine a circuit loop that, as you follow along the circuit, has an AC power source, then a switch, and then the electrical appliance, leading back to the AC source it started from.
If you design the circuit so that you know for sure that the live wire goes to the switch first before the actual load, then your design ensures that if there is a fault or a short somewhere in the appliance, it won't let the live power leak anywhere (because the whole device is only connected to the neutral line, not the hot live voltage that alternates between positive and negative voltage). It's safer, and is less likely to damage the internals of a device. Especially if someone is going to reach inside and forgets to unplug it or cut power at the circuit breaker.
Could you give an example of such a device? Seems like a bad design
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The actual electrical device can be designed such that it depends on exactly which direction is live and which is neutral.
Imagine a circuit loop that, as you follow along the circuit, has an AC power source, then a switch, and then the electrical appliance, leading back to the AC source it started from.
If you design the circuit so that you know for sure that the live wire goes to the switch first before the actual load, then your design ensures that if there is a fault or a short somewhere in the appliance, it won't let the live power leak anywhere (because the whole device is only connected to the neutral line, not the hot live voltage that alternates between positive and negative voltage). It's safer, and is less likely to damage the internals of a device. Especially if someone is going to reach inside and forgets to unplug it or cut power at the circuit breaker.
In practice tons of outlets are wired the wrong way around.
F actually has a convention for the socket, which is probably ignored even more often, but I would never trust live and neutral not to have been swapped somewhere regardless of outlet.Just forcing plug designers to consider live/neutral being randomized in a very obvious manner might be safer in the long run than working on a partially broken system where someone manufacturer might be fooled into trusting it.
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I'd like to see a real world comparison between its safety and Type-F
Both are extremely safe
Do you have a similar breakdown video of the features? I've never seen a rundown of them.
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This diagram doesn’t do the utter goofiness of type M justice.
Here are a few styles you will come across.
I think that might be a combo of type D and M, https://www.worldstandards.eu/electricity/plugs-and-sockets/m/
In South Africa we use M, but I've never seen a socket like the one in the picture
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So is the shutter system. Blocking contacts unless a third is pushed in is great safety, particularly with kids.
That's what I was referring to
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Do you have a similar breakdown video of the features? I've never seen a rundown of them.
No but I found this haha
Why Tom Scott Is WRONG About The British Plug -
For your toaster or iron, yes. For your USB power supply, mobile charger, LED table lamp, game console, etc., which doesn’t even have an earth connection, not so much. But your power board takes up twice the space of a European one with a row of slender unearthed sockets for such devices.
The British standard is still stuck in 1947, where the expected use cases were kettles, washing machines, pre-transistor radios using high-voltage thermionic valves, and the domestic labour-saving devices of the midcentury that needed to be earthed. That and the shortage of copper that led to British houses being wired with a ring main, and each plug having its own fuse, rather than separately fused circuits as elsewhere.
The British standard is still stuck in 1947, where the expected use cases were kettles, washing machines
People still use kettles and washing machines.
For your USB power supply, mobile charger, LED table lamp, game console, etc., which doesn’t even have an earth connection, not so much.
You can get a USB power strip.
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No but I found this haha
Why Tom Scott Is WRONG About The British PlugI just found this one. https://youtu.be/tx5NzxJjT0Q
It seems like they're mostly comparable but the schuko might be a bit safer. As someone in the US the lack of polarity would be an issue for us. But I still think our plug designs are the absolute worst.
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Could you give an example of such a device? Seems like a bad design
A simple lamp can demonstrate.
You have both live and neutral lines in the cable, coming up to a switch, which can either open the circuit on the live line or the neutral line. Then, the lamp itself has a single light bulb as the load.
If you place the switch on the live line, then the energy of the live line stops at the switch, with only whatever lower voltage is in the neutral line to actually be connected to the light bulb and lamp assembly.
But if you place the switch on the neutral line, you're leaving the entire lamp on the voltage of the live line, which gives the voltage more places to potentially short circuit. If you were to take a non-contact voltage detector, you'd be able to detect a live voltage in the line leading up to the bulb, even when it's not turned on.
You generally do this with the in-wall wiring and switches, too, and make the wall switches break open the circuit on the live line, not the neutral line. It's just a better practice overall.
And no, the neutral line is not totally grounded, so it can still pose a danger, too. But safety is exercised in layers, and putting the switch on the live line is the better practice.
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USB. Most things don’t need AC power. We can get rid of wall warts and create a universal standard by including USB C ports on AC plugs.
Oh yeah let's power my 2000W kettle from USB
