A universal socket

[oldtimer]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18266022

There you go on the BBC website apparently they are being used in China

 

[Silly Sausage]

2 croc clips and shove the wires in the socket...International travel sorted.

 

[Engineer54]

BBC News - A universal plug socket... at last?

There you go on the BBC website apparently they are being used in China

Haven't seen them used anywhere i've been in China!! You normally see the Aussie outlets over here. I would imagine if anywhere, it'll be the international hotels that would find a use for these outlets. By the way there are two distinct types of hotels in China, foreign tourist hotels (licensed for foreign guests) and those that aren't!! lol!!!

But as far as i can see, they won't accommodate the German plug top, as far as earthing goes, as they have a scrapping earth, not a pin earth... So not quite as international as it seems!! lol!!

 

[sparc]

The journo here is clearly an idiot -but it's the BBC, so you need to make allowances. He goes on about how clever they are in China to have developed a socket that can accommodate all plugs - but what about voltage? Is it 110 or 230?

He also thinks there are only two types of lamp fitting in the UK - he obviously doesn't change many lamps.

 

[Adam W]

Yes, he goes on about how there is no apparent reason for different plugs and light bulbs apart from being some kind of national identity, and suggests these clever Chinese have finally found a solution which is going to make the world a better place.
While it might be mildly convenient for a minority of travellers who feel the need to take a hairdryer, hair straighteners or some other such piece of specialist equipment with them to another country (nowadays most electronic equipment can be powered by USB which as the name suggests is universal), there seems to be little consideration for matters such as safety - these sockets don't look like they have shuttered holes; the journo even suggests having an earth pin at all is an unnecessary imbuggerance.
He clearly doesn't understand lighting at all either - again, while it might be mildly convenient to take a 'one size fits all' approach to lighting, it wouldn't be very interesting and seems to be a step backwards to when lighting consisted of one pendant in each room and maybe a floor standing lamp with a massive shade, and the only variation available involved changing the shade to match the wallpaper. ES, BC, SES, SBC, GU10, MR11, MR16, G9, PL, not to mention different kinds of commercial and industrial bulbs and tubes, all exist for a specific reason other than to pickle the brain of a simple-minded journalist. Consumers nowadays demand variation and many wouldn't appreciate having their options severely limited on the assumption that they're too stupid to be able to manage to select more than one different kind of light bulb.

This seems to be a similar approach to those 'safety' socket covers - a solution to a problem which doesn't exist and in fact takes things a step backwards.
:94:

 

[trev]

The voltage was the first thing to enter my mind when I read the article. Seems that the journo responsible for the article hasn't been overseas that much

 

[Geordie Spark]

Does anyone remember these?? FITALL plug - ECN Electrical Forums

 

[Fin170]

A universal 230v 50Hz socket isn't a bad idea in itself. Just implementing it would be a difficult task, changing thousands of sockets, the import of millions of cheap adapters, diy everywhere, getting everyone to agree on a standard which is up to ours* and of course some peoples are terrified of a universal standard

*as most don't have shutters or fuses

 

[sedgy34]

Someone went in dragons den with the idea the dragons said it was floored
im out

 

[snowhead]

Does anyone remember these?? FITALL plug - ECN Electrical Forums

Yes remember them well.

Had one on my Dansette record player so I could use it in any room as the house had 15a 3 pin, 15 amp 2 pin, and 5amp 3 pin s/o in various rooms.
Not a 13amp to be seen tho'.

 

[jay sean]

You can just imagine the quality of the thing as it comes from China.

 

[telectrix]

Does anyone remember these?? FITALL plug - ECN Electrical Forums

remember them?? i still got them.

 

[FatallyFlawed]

See www.universalsocket.org.uk for why these things are unsafe.

 

[Lucien Nunes]

The site above gives a good exposition on all the weaknesses of these horrible things. The poor contact aspect is not to be underestimated. There are various kinds of universal socket and one of the versions not shown barely makes contact with the earth of any but one or two plug types, and of course not at all on Schuko or French plugs. I wouldn't like to pass more than an amp or two through most of them.

The BBC article is of course written by a non-technical person, who makes a number of mistakes in the article whilst labouring his political point. For example, the pin spacing of French and German plugs is identical as they are both based on the same standard, the 'curious small 3-pinners' that BS1363 supplemented are still current and do not date from the introduction of electricity, etc etc.

Anyone interested in the variety of plugs around the world should take a look at the Museum of Plugs and Sockets run by Dutch enthusiast Oof Oud, who is much more clued-up on the technical details! On there, amongst the British eccentricities, you will see dissected not only the 'Fittall' but also the 'Crater' which is an earlier and better piece of engineering designed for all six standard British round pin types. Had the BBC man researched his piece at all, he would have realised that there is more to this subject than two bent bit of brass that just about touch the side of his laptop plug pins.

FWIW I was on telly in the 1980s, scary thought that, talking about my plug-design-to-end-all-plug-designs. The IEC effort was just getting off the ground so it felt hopeful, and my concept was new and better. I'm sort of glad it never came about, variety is the spice of life after all!

 

[Engineer54]

Further to Lucien's well founded comments and others, it is impossible to provide a ''cover all'' socket outlet. I've been told by more than a few Chinese Engineers, that the many hotels that have adopted these universal outlets have had some serious repercussions and are either regretting and/or going about changing them for the Aussie configuration outlets which are basically the norm over here for general small power outlets. In many cases, they use the old UK 15A outlets for the larger load appliances such as A/C'S etc....

I can confirm that those universal socket outlets as used here in China are a bloody disaster, virtually all of them, will be seen with burnt surrounds around pin apertures, because the flimsy contacts behind, can't in all honesty cope with the different sizes of plug top pins.

Typical Journalist that thinks about himself and his laptop, that writes an article full of discrepancies without a shred of technical research into what his writing....

 

[Geordie Spark]

It seems to be the same with mobile phones where none of the manufacturers seem to agree on what plug to use to plug the charger into it. For me the iPhone plug has to be the most ungainly clunky thing imaginable. What's wrong with everybody using USB??

 

[Guest111]

I've known a few cases were people have just used an adaptor without worrying about voltage correction,in fact I had quite a heated argument with one chap who didn't believe that the tiny adaptor didn't reduce the voltage from 240 to 110.I was proved right when his gear went bang,lol

 

[FatallyFlawed]

I had quite a heated argument with one chap who didn't believe that the tiny adaptor didn't reduce the voltage from 240 to 110. I was proved right when his gear went bang,lol

Sounds like his gear got more heated than his argument!