The USA approach to this is to mandate a comical number of outlets everywhere (to prevent extension cord usage), mandate a large number of individual circuits (especially for things that draw a large amount of power), and more recently some combo of AFCI/GFCI/CAFCI breakers (to provide some level of sensing things going wrong and shutting off power).
The stats are not great for the USA in terms of number of fires. I haven’t done deep research. From personal experience, most homes built after modern US electrical code was fleshed out are generally fine. Modern homes (or ones upgraded to modern code) seem very safe - the “smart” breakers tend to actually work.
My anecdote here is that my relatively small hometown area (15,000 people, largely built up between 1860-1940) still has frequent fires relating to electrical and heating systems and the current city I live in (95,000 people mostly built up starting in ~1960) has very few fires ever. I spend 2 weeks a year around Christmas back in my hometown. 3 of the last 7 years had a structure loss fire while I was there. In the same period of time there have been 2 structure loss fires in my current city total.
So you’re not saying it’s because the wiring is substandard, but because it’s ring circuits, which are not up to the same standard as if they used a breaker panel.
The standards the UK adopted pass higher voltages and higher currents per household circuit than pretty much anywhere else. They adopted standards that allow them to use use less wiring, less copper to provide the same energy. They can plug in many space heaters on one circuit, where two or three would blow a breaker on a US circuit.
That higher voltage and higher current makes their household circuits inherently more dangerous than household circuits outside the UK. A fault in a UK circuit passes a lot more energy than a similar fault elsewhere, before tripping a current-limiting device. The exact same fault in a UK circuit is far more dangerous than in a circuit pretty much anywhere else in the world. The standards for household wiring in the rest of the world are a lot more restrictive than the standards adopted in the UK.
UK plugs on Japanese appliance in Japanese houses (for example) are overkill. The safety provided by the UK plugs is built into the Japanese breaker panel and wiring. Putting the UK plug/socket into a Japanese circuit provides no significant additional safety benefit. The Japanese plug/socket on a UK circuit would be extraordinarily dangerous.
Again, the amount of current passed depends only on the voltage
Electrically, current depends on voltage and resistance/impedance. In practice, (and most importantly to this discussion), current draw actually depends primarily on the characteristics of the current limiting devices such as breakers, fuses, etc. Breakers on UK household circuits are designed to allow considerably more power than comparable breakers around the world.
This is the primary factor I am talking about.
Neither are the fuses in the plug, which protect the external wiring.
Those fuses are not needed in Japanese (or North American, or most other) plugs. We don’t need to protect the “external wiring” separately from the household wiring: the household circuit breaker is rated lower than the “external wiring”. Drawing a direct short on the “external wiring” in a UK circuit is not sufficient to trip the UK circuit breaker in the UK distribution panel; they need a secondary current limiter (a fuse) to provide that function.
We don’t need fuses in our plugs, specifically because our household circuit breakers are designed to trip well before your fuses would blow. (We do include fuses in any appliance or device with wiring not rated to full current.)
And lastly, no it isn’t. For one, the child safety shutters on all UK outlets are certainly not contained in a Japanese breaker panel.
The function provided by those shutters is achieved in the Japanese wiring by lower voltage, narrow holes in receptacles (allowable because they don’t need as large a contact to safely carry the lower rated current), a flared base on plugs, protective accessories for outlets in risky locations, and whole-house AFCI/GFCI.
Post-war reconstruction, they had a massive copper shortage. The wiring standards they adopted allowed for using as little copper as possible. That meant fewer, high-amperage circuits, rather than many low-amperage circuits. They used “ring circuit” topology instead of “branch circuits” to allow them to use undersized wiring.
Basically, all the shortcuts they took in their household wiring introduce considerably greater risks than exist elsewhere, including North America. Their household wiring is overloaded relative to most of the rest of the world. They mitigated the risks of their household wiring with stricter standards on their appliance wiring. Which is why they need a plug for their phone charger comparable to the plugs we use on a welder.
It’s a good plug A damn good plug. It’s just complete overkill for electric systems outside of the UK.
That makes sense, but imo for those country that follow UK standard with 220v/240v power everywhere in the house, it better be overkill than not. But then i guess that’s why EU also have this two pin plug for low power application that come with partially insulated pin, and won’t hurt your feet when step on. Best of both world!
It’s not just the voltage It’s also the allowable current per circuit. UK circuits allow much higher power (wattage) than single household circuits in the rest of the world. That’s why they need those big-ass plugs on each of their appliances.
There’s no UK standard for three-phase and high amperage sockets or plugs. In fact, UK sockets don’t support 16A three-phase at all, so if you have higher power needs (for example for EV charging) you’re left with having to install a dedicated wall box that uses an entirely different connector than the 3-pin UK plug, BS 1363.
Given this incompatibility, how can you argue that UK sockets are better, for instance, than SN 441011?
To say nothing of how comically giant every appliance plug needs to be, regardless of how low its wattage is?
By this logic, a potato is the best in terms of electrical safety. That’s of course tongue in cheek, but if we’re reducing plug capabilities in the interest of calling them safe, USB-A 1.0 is the “safest” because it only outputs 5V at 3A.
I’m sure I don’t need to point out how the plug is part of a broader electrical system and forms an integral part of it. Excusing the plug from an entire host of applications by stating that a different standard solves for that is the very point of my comment.
SN441011 is the Swiss system that through its 2-, 3- and 5-pin design supports single- and three-phase for up to 11 kW in domestic applications.
As an aide, regarding fuses in UK plugs: Putting the onus of electrical safety on the user for home repairs with a screwdriver is, in my opinion, inherently unsafe, especially when there’s no safe backup through a circuit breaker. Imagine an impatient user replaces a burnt fuse with a piece of aluminum foil.
Thank you for your concern, but the comment was, as I said, tongue in cheek.
I’m confused about why you’re being so hostile. My only intention is to understand the rationale behind labeling the UK plug as the safest. We’ve already identified that the manner of how it fits into a wider, modern domestic setting is antiquated and other standards and plugs need to fit this purpose. You for example called out IEC 60309 for EVSE, SN441011 for household appliances, and the risks that plug fuses introduce through the nature of them needing to be repaired by an unskilled layperson with analogies to similarly unsafe practices.
If other plugs provide safe alternatives for the issues I’ve reiterated, shouldn’t we be looking at those plugs as safer alternatives?
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The USA approach to this is to mandate a comical number of outlets everywhere (to prevent extension cord usage), mandate a large number of individual circuits (especially for things that draw a large amount of power), and more recently some combo of AFCI/GFCI/CAFCI breakers (to provide some level of sensing things going wrong and shutting off power).
The stats are not great for the USA in terms of number of fires. I haven’t done deep research. From personal experience, most homes built after modern US electrical code was fleshed out are generally fine. Modern homes (or ones upgraded to modern code) seem very safe - the “smart” breakers tend to actually work.
My anecdote here is that my relatively small hometown area (15,000 people, largely built up between 1860-1940) still has frequent fires relating to electrical and heating systems and the current city I live in (95,000 people mostly built up starting in ~1960) has very few fires ever. I spend 2 weeks a year around Christmas back in my hometown. 3 of the last 7 years had a structure loss fire while I was there. In the same period of time there have been 2 structure loss fires in my current city total.
And Europe doesn’t have old houses with the same difficulty in wiring?
So you’re not saying it’s because the wiring is substandard, but because it’s ring circuits, which are not up to the same standard as if they used a breaker panel.
Isn’t that the same thing?
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The standards the UK adopted pass higher voltages and higher currents per household circuit than pretty much anywhere else. They adopted standards that allow them to use use less wiring, less copper to provide the same energy. They can plug in many space heaters on one circuit, where two or three would blow a breaker on a US circuit.
That higher voltage and higher current makes their household circuits inherently more dangerous than household circuits outside the UK. A fault in a UK circuit passes a lot more energy than a similar fault elsewhere, before tripping a current-limiting device. The exact same fault in a UK circuit is far more dangerous than in a circuit pretty much anywhere else in the world. The standards for household wiring in the rest of the world are a lot more restrictive than the standards adopted in the UK.
UK plugs on Japanese appliance in Japanese houses (for example) are overkill. The safety provided by the UK plugs is built into the Japanese breaker panel and wiring. Putting the UK plug/socket into a Japanese circuit provides no significant additional safety benefit. The Japanese plug/socket on a UK circuit would be extraordinarily dangerous.
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Electrically, current depends on voltage and resistance/impedance. In practice, (and most importantly to this discussion), current draw actually depends primarily on the characteristics of the current limiting devices such as breakers, fuses, etc. Breakers on UK household circuits are designed to allow considerably more power than comparable breakers around the world.
This is the primary factor I am talking about.
Those fuses are not needed in Japanese (or North American, or most other) plugs. We don’t need to protect the “external wiring” separately from the household wiring: the household circuit breaker is rated lower than the “external wiring”. Drawing a direct short on the “external wiring” in a UK circuit is not sufficient to trip the UK circuit breaker in the UK distribution panel; they need a secondary current limiter (a fuse) to provide that function.
We don’t need fuses in our plugs, specifically because our household circuit breakers are designed to trip well before your fuses would blow. (We do include fuses in any appliance or device with wiring not rated to full current.)
The function provided by those shutters is achieved in the Japanese wiring by lower voltage, narrow holes in receptacles (allowable because they don’t need as large a contact to safely carry the lower rated current), a flared base on plugs, protective accessories for outlets in risky locations, and whole-house AFCI/GFCI.
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You know that extension cords can have breakers or fuses in them?
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Care to elaborate on this? Imo it does sounds like a win if that’s the case.
Post-war reconstruction, they had a massive copper shortage. The wiring standards they adopted allowed for using as little copper as possible. That meant fewer, high-amperage circuits, rather than many low-amperage circuits. They used “ring circuit” topology instead of “branch circuits” to allow them to use undersized wiring.
Basically, all the shortcuts they took in their household wiring introduce considerably greater risks than exist elsewhere, including North America. Their household wiring is overloaded relative to most of the rest of the world. They mitigated the risks of their household wiring with stricter standards on their appliance wiring. Which is why they need a plug for their phone charger comparable to the plugs we use on a welder.
It’s a good plug A damn good plug. It’s just complete overkill for electric systems outside of the UK.
That makes sense, but imo for those country that follow UK standard with 220v/240v power everywhere in the house, it better be overkill than not. But then i guess that’s why EU also have this two pin plug for low power application that come with partially insulated pin, and won’t hurt your feet when step on. Best of both world!
It’s not just the voltage It’s also the allowable current per circuit. UK circuits allow much higher power (wattage) than single household circuits in the rest of the world. That’s why they need those big-ass plugs on each of their appliances.
Thank you for pointing this out. A “good enough” system that downloads all the headaches onto the users. War time shit.
Sounds like the problem is people leaving plugs lying on the ground? Otherwise known as user error.
Or what they called it: Skill Issue.
Also best for staying in sockets but not getting stuck
You sound like ElectroBOOM.
There’s no UK standard for three-phase and high amperage sockets or plugs. In fact, UK sockets don’t support 16A three-phase at all, so if you have higher power needs (for example for EV charging) you’re left with having to install a dedicated wall box that uses an entirely different connector than the 3-pin UK plug, BS 1363.
Given this incompatibility, how can you argue that UK sockets are better, for instance, than SN 441011?
To say nothing of how comically giant every appliance plug needs to be, regardless of how low its wattage is?
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By this logic, a potato is the best in terms of electrical safety. That’s of course tongue in cheek, but if we’re reducing plug capabilities in the interest of calling them safe, USB-A 1.0 is the “safest” because it only outputs 5V at 3A.
I’m sure I don’t need to point out how the plug is part of a broader electrical system and forms an integral part of it. Excusing the plug from an entire host of applications by stating that a different standard solves for that is the very point of my comment.
SN441011 is the Swiss system that through its 2-, 3- and 5-pin design supports single- and three-phase for up to 11 kW in domestic applications.
As an aide, regarding fuses in UK plugs: Putting the onus of electrical safety on the user for home repairs with a screwdriver is, in my opinion, inherently unsafe, especially when there’s no safe backup through a circuit breaker. Imagine an impatient user replaces a burnt fuse with a piece of aluminum foil.
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Thank you for your concern, but the comment was, as I said, tongue in cheek.
I’m confused about why you’re being so hostile. My only intention is to understand the rationale behind labeling the UK plug as the safest. We’ve already identified that the manner of how it fits into a wider, modern domestic setting is antiquated and other standards and plugs need to fit this purpose. You for example called out IEC 60309 for EVSE, SN441011 for household appliances, and the risks that plug fuses introduce through the nature of them needing to be repaired by an unskilled layperson with analogies to similarly unsafe practices.
If other plugs provide safe alternatives for the issues I’ve reiterated, shouldn’t we be looking at those plugs as safer alternatives?
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Impossible to plug small plug into big power. I see no problems.
Australia’s is way better lmao
AS/NZS 3112
Simply the best
I won’t go that far