Comment on British plugs
Assassassin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 hours agoOne feature of UK plugs I really like is the built in warding of the live/neutral slots. The ground prong is longer to allow for the mechanism to unlock the hot slot when inserted. It’s essentially a built in childproofing.
Devial@discuss.online 15 hours ago
Jup, that’s a really good feature. You can get aftermarket child shutters for EU style plugs as well, but they require you to twist the plug before inserting, making them kinda inconvenient, and they have to be specifically installed by parents. Though I don’t think that’s the worst thing in the world. After all, we don’t make any of our other products or home designs toddler safe by default. It’s generally regarded as the parents responsibility to ensure their home is child proof before they get a child.
But the UK version of just having it in every outlet as a hidden feature that you wouldn’t even notice if you don’t know it’s there is definitely the best approach.
(Though it does make low form factor UK plugs almost impossible, because every plug must have a ground prong, if there’s no actual safety need to have one)
AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 11 hours ago
Perhaps it could be revised by adding two unearthed Europlug round-pin sockets below the broad pins, though within a recess shaped like the thin European plugs to prevent the connection of earthed plugs, and declaring Europlug to be a British standard for unearthed mains, for use with devices not requiring earthing. Not sure if the geometry would work out, though.
Devial@discuss.online 11 hours ago
It’s possible to that of course, but I doubt it’s worth it. It also couldn’t be adapted as is, because fuses in each plug are always required t for UK plugs, they aren’t for EU plugs. And if you have to adapt a narrow EU plug to hold a replacable fuse would eat into size savings, require adapting the standard and require entirely new production lines for the modified plugs, so almost certainly simply not worth it.