3 ms·

The Type I (AU/NZ) plug is different to the Type I (China) plug. For one thing, the Chinese one is upside down (or maybe the AU one is?) but the biggest differe

The Type I (AU/NZ) plug is different to the Type I (China) plug. For one thing, the Chinese one is upside down (or maybe the AU one is?) but the biggest difference is the AU standard requires the active and neutral conductors to have insulation over half of the conductor (presumably to prevent a kid with a butter knife or paper-clip touching the hot conductor on a half-inserted plug). The Chinese one has no such protection (also, generally seem to have holes on the pins). So while they may be inter-operable, they're not necessarily legal or safe (for example, the Argentinian Type I apparently swaps active and neutral). In the same way that a Euro (Type E) plug can fit in a UK (Type G) socket if you can push Earth door open (useful not just for travelling Europe, but also Asia, where Indonesia uses E, but Malaysia uses G. But you really shouldn't do that). I'm curious why American Samoa uses Type I (among 3 others) but on 60Hz/110V... Also, some of the voltages are wrong; AU is listed as 230V, but the situation varies between states, and between nominal and actual. In short; Wikipedia has more detail and accuracy.

jamesbfb 4y ago
> presumably to prevent a kid with a butter knife or paper-clip touching the hot conductor on a half-inserted plug Correct! That said, I don’t know how regulated it is since I have quite a few IEC cables without that insulation.
- SulphurCrested 4y ago
  The standard was changed around 20 years ago to require the insulation. Before that, it wasn't required. Those IEC cables are probably just older than that. A couple of other things they also did away with are non-moulded plugs supplied with appliances new, and piggy-back plugs.
  - askvictor 4y ago
    Piggy-back is OK (you can still buy piggy-back extension leads), except for the case of a DIY piggy-back plug - this runs the risk of someone wiring two of them together, or a piggy-back plug to a male plug, resulting in danger.
- askvictor 4y ago
  Having just read about this a bit more, it looks like it is also to prevent something falling onto a half-inserted plug and causing *sparks*. China's "upside-down" version is also a solution to this, in that something falling would fall onto the earth pin first. Not sure how that works for two-pin plugs.

jamesbfb 4y ago

> presumably to prevent a kid with a butter knife or paper-clip touching the hot conductor on a half-inserted plug Correct! That said, I don’t know how regulated it is since I have quite a few IEC cables without that insulation.

SulphurCrested 4y ago
The standard was changed around 20 years ago to require the insulation. Before that, it wasn't required. Those IEC cables are probably just older than that. A couple of other things they also did away with are non-moulded plugs supplied with appliances new, and piggy-back plugs.
- askvictor 4y ago
  Piggy-back is OK (you can still buy piggy-back extension leads), except for the case of a DIY piggy-back plug - this runs the risk of someone wiring two of them together, or a piggy-back plug to a male plug, resulting in danger.
askvictor 4y ago
Having just read about this a bit more, it looks like it is also to prevent something falling onto a half-inserted plug and causing *sparks*. China's "upside-down" version is also a solution to this, in that something falling would fall onto the earth pin first. Not sure how that works for two-pin plugs.