Christmas Trees Confuse Me
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Rob Philpott wrote:
I don't really get any of these things. Here in the UK every plug has a fuse in it, every plug has three pins (not always used for 'double insulated' appliances) and a punchy 240v flows through those terminals.
I know what you mean. I lived in Britain for just under 6 months. I remember the plugs were entirely different from what we have in the US. I needed to buy an array of plug adapters designed for multiple types of plugs for various foreign countries. That allowed me to operate my electrical devices. I don't know if the adapters changed the volts and amps of the outlet's electricity, but I assume they did. Otherwise, I suspect my electronic devices would short-circuit and die. In the US, the standard power for residential applications is 120 volts and 15 amps. Multiplied together, these give us 1800 watts. It's an alternating current that cycles 60 times per second. I know in the UK, 240 volts is the standard, but I've long forgotten how many amps there are. I assume that the current cycles are 60 times per second, but I don't know. I'll have to Google that. Here's a link: England residential electricity volts amps cycles - Google Search[^] This is one of the results that popped up. Sounds as though it's correct.
A standard UK plug socket typically supplies electricity at 230 volts AC and up to 13 amps. Strictly speaking, 32A if fed via a ring main or 20A if fed from a radial circuit. The plug is the limiting factor, not the socket. Plugtops (the correct term) are fitted with a maximum of a 13A fuse.Sep 28, 2017
One of the search results stated that in the UK, AC electrical current cycles at 30 times per second.
Yeah, that 230v is a misnomer. It's still 240v but we label everything as 230v and add a tolerance to harmonise with Europe's 220v. So we've got 240, they've got 220 and we all call it 230! 50Hz. Ah, the 50Hz hum. You get to recognise it, whenever a jack plug isn't in properly or something. I've not heard the US 60Hz, but I guess your mains hum must be a couple of semitones higher (I could work it out, but can't be bothered!) 1800W - that's not a lot. So the most common fuse here is 13A which gives an appliance circa 3KW. I'm told that a 13a fuse will actually blow at about 20 amps. My ovens require a 16A fuse, but I've just stuck a 13A socket on them and they work fine, which is handy as otherwise I'd have to go all the way back to the consumer unit. I, and probably some other weirdos, feel some affection for our 3 pin plug. It heralds from a time when the UK did things properly (now we just do everything as cheaply as possible or better yet import it). The earth pin is longer than the live/neutral, and the extra length opens shutters in the socket which prevents kids sticking metal things in the sockets. Everything is fused and earthed. It's very good! But coming back to the 120v, I wonder what that feels like. Having had more than my fair share of connections to 240v, I can say it certainly wakes you up (at a minimum). Actually, I had a near fatal shock when I was six where I couldn't let go which burned a hole in my hand. 240v is lethal, your chances have to be much better at 120v, so maybe the need for all the clever stuff of the three pin plug isn't needed. I don't know why I find all this so interesting.... :)
Regards, Rob Philpott.
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Yeah, that 230v is a misnomer. It's still 240v but we label everything as 230v and add a tolerance to harmonise with Europe's 220v. So we've got 240, they've got 220 and we all call it 230! 50Hz. Ah, the 50Hz hum. You get to recognise it, whenever a jack plug isn't in properly or something. I've not heard the US 60Hz, but I guess your mains hum must be a couple of semitones higher (I could work it out, but can't be bothered!) 1800W - that's not a lot. So the most common fuse here is 13A which gives an appliance circa 3KW. I'm told that a 13a fuse will actually blow at about 20 amps. My ovens require a 16A fuse, but I've just stuck a 13A socket on them and they work fine, which is handy as otherwise I'd have to go all the way back to the consumer unit. I, and probably some other weirdos, feel some affection for our 3 pin plug. It heralds from a time when the UK did things properly (now we just do everything as cheaply as possible or better yet import it). The earth pin is longer than the live/neutral, and the extra length opens shutters in the socket which prevents kids sticking metal things in the sockets. Everything is fused and earthed. It's very good! But coming back to the 120v, I wonder what that feels like. Having had more than my fair share of connections to 240v, I can say it certainly wakes you up (at a minimum). Actually, I had a near fatal shock when I was six where I couldn't let go which burned a hole in my hand. 240v is lethal, your chances have to be much better at 120v, so maybe the need for all the clever stuff of the three pin plug isn't needed. I don't know why I find all this so interesting.... :)
Regards, Rob Philpott.
Rob Philpott wrote:
But coming back to the 120v, I wonder what that feels like.
It's happened to me. I felt quite shocked. Ha! :laugh: That was awful, wasn't it? I deserve to be berated. Seriously though, when I was around age 4, I somehow received an electric shock while trying to push my finger into an electrical socket. That's not supposed to happen. I didn't understand electricity or electrical sockets. I thought that something sharp inside the socket had suddenly jumped out and jabbed me. I concluded that an ill-tempered tiny little animal lived inside. I never tried it again. I have also been shocked inadvertently by making skin contact with the power cable to the vacuum cleaner. Its protective sheath was previously mangled by the vacuum cleaner itself, exposing the wires. The shock certainly got my attention, but I don't remember it being particularly painful.
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Do you ever take a step back and think about the idea of a Christmas tree? I know why it all started. That makes sense to me. What I don't understand is why a person would go chop down some perfectly good tree, drag it into their house, stand it upright in a bowl of water, and wrap it with several yards of electrical wire. Why not just drive your car into your house? The electrical plugs are two-pronged and haven't a ground connection. There's no fuse. We need to remember that the tree is standing in a metal bowl of water. You can call me an idiot. People do it all the time. Regardless, I think a fuse and ground connection might come in useful. You're wrapping a flammable plant in electrical wire that's surging with 120 volts of electricity. The whole thing is precariously braced upright by 3 screws anchored to a metal bowl filled with water, and it's inside your house. Christmas trees are dangerous. I'll bet there's an existing term for the phobia of Christmas trees. I haven't a clue as to what the term could be. That's a difficult one. Any ideas? The question I can't answer is, why? Does it symbolize something? What meaning does it have, and what amount of importance supports that meaning? There must be something that compels people to spend time and effort on such a perplexing activity. Is it worth getting electrocuted over? Is it so important that you're willing to let your house burn down? Why kill trees? It doesn't need to be chopped down. Just go outside, find a tree, and decorate it with shiny objects. I don't understand it. :wtf:
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Rob Philpott wrote:
But coming back to the 120v, I wonder what that feels like.
It's happened to me. I felt quite shocked. Ha! :laugh: That was awful, wasn't it? I deserve to be berated. Seriously though, when I was around age 4, I somehow received an electric shock while trying to push my finger into an electrical socket. That's not supposed to happen. I didn't understand electricity or electrical sockets. I thought that something sharp inside the socket had suddenly jumped out and jabbed me. I concluded that an ill-tempered tiny little animal lived inside. I never tried it again. I have also been shocked inadvertently by making skin contact with the power cable to the vacuum cleaner. Its protective sheath was previously mangled by the vacuum cleaner itself, exposing the wires. The shock certainly got my attention, but I don't remember it being particularly painful.
Most of Norway uses a power distribution system called "IT", Isolated Terra (i.e. ground), rather than "TN", Terra and Neutral. IT is "delta" 3-phase: There is no neutral; you'll find 230V between two triangle corners. TN uses "star" 3-phase, with 230V from a corner to a center neutral, 400V between triangle corners. With IT, the two pins giving you 230V is supposed to be symmetric around ground potential (otherwise you have a ground problem that should be fixed). So e.g. if one of the conductors shortcut to the shield of the apparatus, you touch it and ground at the same time, you will experience roughly half the voltage. To get a 230V shock, you would have to touch both conductors at the same time, before the fuse blows. In a TN system, you will have a 230V blow if you touch any conductor, and you are grounded. If you touch two corners of the star, i.e. two live conductors on different phases, you get a 400V blow. Several times I have tried to make power supply people explain to me what is so great about TN, what's in it for me as a consumer. They invariably come up with a lot of advantages as seen from the power station, things that I do not see as a consumer. I am currently on an IT network, and I see no reason to fight for an "upgrade" to TN. (It won't happen anyway, as it would require all new cabling: IT manages with 3 conductors, TN requires 4 or 5, depending on whether you want a separate ground conductor. The only issue with IT is for those who want to install a fast 3-phase charger for their electric cars. Very few cars have onboard chargers that can handle 3*230V, almost all are for 3*400V. As I do not yet have an electric car, it doesn't matter much. Besides, an 11 or 22 kW single-phase charger is fast enough for me (with less wear on the batteries). I much prefer a lower shock in case of a short circuit somewhere.
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Yeah, that 230v is a misnomer. It's still 240v but we label everything as 230v and add a tolerance to harmonise with Europe's 220v. So we've got 240, they've got 220 and we all call it 230! 50Hz. Ah, the 50Hz hum. You get to recognise it, whenever a jack plug isn't in properly or something. I've not heard the US 60Hz, but I guess your mains hum must be a couple of semitones higher (I could work it out, but can't be bothered!) 1800W - that's not a lot. So the most common fuse here is 13A which gives an appliance circa 3KW. I'm told that a 13a fuse will actually blow at about 20 amps. My ovens require a 16A fuse, but I've just stuck a 13A socket on them and they work fine, which is handy as otherwise I'd have to go all the way back to the consumer unit. I, and probably some other weirdos, feel some affection for our 3 pin plug. It heralds from a time when the UK did things properly (now we just do everything as cheaply as possible or better yet import it). The earth pin is longer than the live/neutral, and the extra length opens shutters in the socket which prevents kids sticking metal things in the sockets. Everything is fused and earthed. It's very good! But coming back to the 120v, I wonder what that feels like. Having had more than my fair share of connections to 240v, I can say it certainly wakes you up (at a minimum). Actually, I had a near fatal shock when I was six where I couldn't let go which burned a hole in my hand. 240v is lethal, your chances have to be much better at 120v, so maybe the need for all the clever stuff of the three pin plug isn't needed. I don't know why I find all this so interesting.... :)
Regards, Rob Philpott.
Rob Philpott wrote:
socket which prevents kids sticking metal things
Interesting. Seems like that was invented in 1928. Search for "child-safe". Far as I know and certainly based on my memory, child safety is a lot newer in the US. Museum of Plugs and Sockets: history of British plugs andsockets[^]
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trønderen wrote:
UK is the only country I know of which (often) has fuses in the socket. (And the only country to use those huge sockets fuse or not.)
My mother-in-law's house in South Africa also used giant plugs, albeit of a design different to the British standard (three round prongs, with the ground larger than the other two). I understand that the modern South African standard uses something closer to the European standard. I don't remember off-hand whether the sockets were fused.
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. -- 6079 Smith W.
South African plugs were almost identical to BS546 British "three pin round" plugs which preceded the BS1363 "three pin square (sic)" plugs that we currently use domestically. BS546 plugs are still widely found in theatres, to discriminate between dimmer circuits and standard circuits. They have advantage, in the theatre context, of no fuse in the plug to blow; the circuits are individually fused centrally.
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Rob Philpott wrote:
I don't really get any of these things. Here in the UK every plug has a fuse in it, every plug has three pins (not always used for 'double insulated' appliances) and a punchy 240v flows through those terminals.
I know what you mean. I lived in Britain for just under 6 months. I remember the plugs were entirely different from what we have in the US. I needed to buy an array of plug adapters designed for multiple types of plugs for various foreign countries. That allowed me to operate my electrical devices. I don't know if the adapters changed the volts and amps of the outlet's electricity, but I assume they did. Otherwise, I suspect my electronic devices would short-circuit and die. In the US, the standard power for residential applications is 120 volts and 15 amps. Multiplied together, these give us 1800 watts. It's an alternating current that cycles 60 times per second. I know in the UK, 240 volts is the standard, but I've long forgotten how many amps there are. I assume that the current cycles are 60 times per second, but I don't know. I'll have to Google that. Here's a link: England residential electricity volts amps cycles - Google Search[^] This is one of the results that popped up. Sounds as though it's correct.
A standard UK plug socket typically supplies electricity at 230 volts AC and up to 13 amps. Strictly speaking, 32A if fed via a ring main or 20A if fed from a radial circuit. The plug is the limiting factor, not the socket. Plugtops (the correct term) are fitted with a maximum of a 13A fuse.Sep 28, 2017
One of the search results stated that in the UK, AC electrical current cycles at 30 times per second.
UK power, like Europe, is 50Hz.