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Interesting! You might already know this, but in the UK our super bulky plugs are designed to avoid contact with hot pins by having a longer earth pin than the

Interesting! You might already know this, but in the UK our super bulky plugs are designed to avoid contact with hot pins by having a longer earth pin than the others so when you remove the plug, by the time there is enough gap for your fingers to slip onto the metal, all the pins will be fully disconnected from the socket. https://www.electricaltechnology.org/2019/05/why-earth-pin-is-thicker-and-longer.html/amp https://www.electricaltechnology.org/2019/05/why-earth-pin-i...

aix1 5y ago
> by the time there is enough gap for your fingers to slip onto the metal, all the pins will be fully disconnected from the socket I think this should read "by the time the metal parts of the line and neutral pins are exposed, they have been disconnected from the mains". (I.e. nothing to do with the width of the gap/fingers.)
- yardstick 5y ago
  Yes you correct
walrus01 5y ago
Yeah about ten years ago I rewired my home office with bs1363 format extensions and sockets (In south Asia) to solve issues with shoddy wiring and lack of grounding where I was renting at the time.
Doxin 5y ago
EU plugs have the same feature, while being less bulky[0]. Especially so for the ungrounded variations[1]. Note that the EU sockets also have shutters in front of the live connections like UK plugs, even for the ungrounded ones. [0] https://i.imgur.com/hxNh3H3.jpg https://i.imgur.com/hxNh3H3.jpg [1] https://i.imgur.com/9e6imGA.jpg https://i.imgur.com/9e6imGA.jpg
- fy20 5y ago
  > Note that the EU sockets also have shutters in front of the live connections like UK plugs, even for the ungrounded ones That's not true everywhere. In my country (Schuko) you can get child-proof sockets with shutters, but I have never seen them used anywhere - in commercial or residential buildings.
  - Doxin 5y ago
    There's the explicitly child-proof sockets that require some stupid action like twisting the plug into them[0] but that's not what I'm talking about. Any new EU socket should come with shutters built in[1] which prevent poking something into a single hole. They only move out of the way if something gets poked into both holes. The shutters are often black, which means that it's basically impossible to see them under normal lighting conditions. Of course there are still plenty of old sockets out in the world which lack these safety features. [0] https://i.imgur.com/66LK2ZB.jpg https://i.imgur.com/66LK2ZB.jpg [1] https://i.imgur.com/rs57bjn.jpg https://i.imgur.com/rs57bjn.jpg
  - qayxc 5y ago
    Maybe you didn't look? You can't see the shutters from the outside unless you look straight into them and they're painted red (mine aren't for example, so cannot tell until you plug something in).
- yardstick 5y ago
  I’ve always found the EU (and US) plugs horribly flimsy. Despite their bulk I’d pick the UK plugs over any type.
  - pmontra 5y ago
    Yes I can understand that but by any practical purpose all the plugs I used around the world should be more or less equally safe, with unnoticeable differences. A truly dangerous plug design would have killed enough people to be discarded by now. We're using local optima and the cost to move to the global one, whichever it is, outweighs the benefit. I live in Italy and recently the number of appliances sold with a German plug increased. I guess it costs less for the manufacturer to sell the same plug everywhere. They are offloading the costs to customers because not all sockets in my home accept that plug. Some of them are not multi standard, even the high Ampere ones. Eventually manufacturers could standardize plugs much more than regulations do.
    - kazen44 5y ago
      in the EU schuko/europlug seems to be slowly becoming the standard everywhere.
  - int_19h 5y ago
    Have you seen the AU/NZ ones? They require insulation on the pins, and physical switches on the outlets.
    - toomanybeersies 5y ago
      Maybe I'm biased, but I really love the AU/NZ plugs and sockets. Out of all the different standards, they're probably the least ugly looking; switched outlets are a (literal and figurative) lifesaver; and it's incredibly useful that you can put a 10 amp plug in a 15 amp socket, but not a 15A into a 10A.
      - genewitch 5y ago
        The US plugs that have a sideways T are the lower amperage compatible style, but everything over 20A has a plug that is circular in arrangement. You can put a 10A in the one with a sideways T, but not the converse, because the hot leg is rotated 90°. To be fair I've never seen that plug in the wild, but I don't go out much.

aix1 5y ago

> by the time there is enough gap for your fingers to slip onto the metal, all the pins will be fully disconnected from the socket I think this should read "by the time the metal parts of the line and neutral pins are exposed, they have been disconnected from the mains". (I.e. nothing to do with the width of the gap/fingers.)

yardstick 5y ago
Yes you correct

walrus01 5y ago

Yeah about ten years ago I rewired my home office with bs1363 format extensions and sockets (In south Asia) to solve issues with shoddy wiring and lack of grounding where I was renting at the time.

Doxin 5y ago

EU plugs have the same feature, while being less bulky[0]. Especially so for the ungrounded variations[1]. Note that the EU sockets also have shutters in front of the live connections like UK plugs, even for the ungrounded ones. [0] https://i.imgur.com/hxNh3H3.jpg https://i.imgur.com/hxNh3H3.jpg [1] https://i.imgur.com/9e6imGA.jpg https://i.imgur.com/9e6imGA.jpg

fy20 5y ago
> Note that the EU sockets also have shutters in front of the live connections like UK plugs, even for the ungrounded ones That's not true everywhere. In my country (Schuko) you can get child-proof sockets with shutters, but I have never seen them used anywhere - in commercial or residential buildings.
- Doxin 5y ago
  There's the explicitly child-proof sockets that require some stupid action like twisting the plug into them[0] but that's not what I'm talking about. Any new EU socket should come with shutters built in[1] which prevent poking something into a single hole. They only move out of the way if something gets poked into both holes. The shutters are often black, which means that it's basically impossible to see them under normal lighting conditions. Of course there are still plenty of old sockets out in the world which lack these safety features. [0] https://i.imgur.com/66LK2ZB.jpg https://i.imgur.com/66LK2ZB.jpg [1] https://i.imgur.com/rs57bjn.jpg https://i.imgur.com/rs57bjn.jpg
- qayxc 5y ago
  Maybe you didn't look? You can't see the shutters from the outside unless you look straight into them and they're painted red (mine aren't for example, so cannot tell until you plug something in).
yardstick 5y ago
I’ve always found the EU (and US) plugs horribly flimsy. Despite their bulk I’d pick the UK plugs over any type.
- pmontra 5y ago
  Yes I can understand that but by any practical purpose all the plugs I used around the world should be more or less equally safe, with unnoticeable differences. A truly dangerous plug design would have killed enough people to be discarded by now. We're using local optima and the cost to move to the global one, whichever it is, outweighs the benefit. I live in Italy and recently the number of appliances sold with a German plug increased. I guess it costs less for the manufacturer to sell the same plug everywhere. They are offloading the costs to customers because not all sockets in my home accept that plug. Some of them are not multi standard, even the high Ampere ones. Eventually manufacturers could standardize plugs much more than regulations do.
  - kazen44 5y ago
    in the EU schuko/europlug seems to be slowly becoming the standard everywhere.
- int_19h 5y ago
  Have you seen the AU/NZ ones? They require insulation on the pins, and physical switches on the outlets.
  - toomanybeersies 5y ago
    Maybe I'm biased, but I really love the AU/NZ plugs and sockets. Out of all the different standards, they're probably the least ugly looking; switched outlets are a (literal and figurative) lifesaver; and it's incredibly useful that you can put a 10 amp plug in a 15 amp socket, but not a 15A into a 10A.
    - genewitch 5y ago
      The US plugs that have a sideways T are the lower amperage compatible style, but everything over 20A has a plug that is circular in arrangement. You can put a 10A in the one with a sideways T, but not the converse, because the hot leg is rotated 90°. To be fair I've never seen that plug in the wild, but I don't go out much.