Brilliant design: RCA student radically improves the UK plug

http://www.iconeye.com/index.php?view=article&catid=1:latest-news&layout=news&id=3864:rca-student-radically-improves-the-uk-plug&option=com_content&Itemid=18&ref=nf

by shedd • 16 years ago

314 140 16 years ago

iconeye.com

latentflip• 16 years ago

I saw this when it first did the rounds on Twitter a while agi, and I have wondered about it since; I'd love to get my hands on one.

The FAQs on his site claims it will be released this year: http://www.madeinmind.co.uk/faq.php - I sure hope so.

arethuza2• 16 years ago

I'm surprised that Apple UK don't buy exclusive rights to that design.

ez77• 16 years ago

No need. They'll probably take the main idea, polish it and then patent it.

ars5• 16 years ago

Tiny bit of history:

The reason plugs in the UK are so big is that each one must be individually fused. And the reason for that is something called a "ring circuit".

In a ring circuit you have, say, a 40 amp fuse at the mains/box. From this you send out two wires, each rated only for 20 amps, going in a circle around the house. You can now supply 40 amps worth of power using only cheaper 20 amp wires. (Since the current can flow over both wires at once.)

But this means that the wires going to an individual appliance are far too small for the main breaker, so each appliance gets a fuse in the plug.

Ring circuits have serious drawbacks, but they helped during a time when there was a copper shortage.

And ever since then the UK has been stuck with huge plugs.

nodata• 16 years ago

Interesting. What other serious drawbacks do they have? Any other countries use them?

junglefever• 16 years ago

I think that Singapore use the same plug.

masklinn7• 16 years ago

> What other serious drawbacks do they have?

They tend to rest on the plug's back, and hurt a lot when you step on them.

> Any other countries use them?

India and South Africa use the so-called Type D plug[0] (also called Type M in its 15A incarnation), which is similar but uses round plugs (type D is actually an older english standard). Some other south-east asian countries also use Type D. The english plug is called "Type G" and used in a number of former colonies and protectorates[1], especially in Africa and the Middle East.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Type...

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Type...

KoZeN• 16 years ago

Ireland also use them.

ajb• 16 years ago

This is all true, but it doesn't explain why they have to be shaped like a caltrops.

I wish someone would come up with a design which doesn't hurt so much when you accidentally tread on one.

teamonkey2• 16 years ago

I think that's simply so that the wire runs parallel to the wall instead of sticking out at 90 degrees. Without a movable part it's hard to have one feature without the other.

stuhacking• 16 years ago

This is a common complaint. I wonder where people are leaving their unused plugs that they constantly tread on them? Probably not in a storage box/drawer.

andrewingram• 16 years ago

This image of the first prototype shows that the need for an individual fuse has been designed for:

http://www.minkyu.co.uk/Site/Product/Entries/2009/4/20_Foldi...

The promo shots of the final working model don't show how you get at the fuse, but I'd be very surprised if it has been overlooked. I suspect it's something to do with the red dots.

masklinn7• 16 years ago

> The promo shots of the final working model don't show how you get at the fuse, but I'd be very surprised if it has been overlooked. I suspect it's something to do with the red dots.

Indeed, the red dot is the plug cover. This set of blogspam pictures don't show it, but previous sets (the folding plug first made rounds in mid-2009) showed how the plug works. You can see an "action shot" simulation of the plug in the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6DvjKkGT6s#t=1m46

points9• 16 years ago

That's not really fair.

Given a choice between US plugs (spark, fall out of sockets, flimsy, dangerous, bendy pins), and UK plugs (Built to last, don't spark, fused, solid) I know which I'd choose.

There's also large advantages to having each plug individually fused - individual appliances blow rather than the whole circuit.

So I wouldn't say we're "stuck with huge plugs". The only real time it's a slight issue/pain is when you go on a plane and the cables take up a bit of space.

JoeAltmaier6• 16 years ago

Wow, so self-delusion is alive and well in the UK!

"The only time its a slight issue"???

How about manufacturing, shipping, selling, storing, repairing, and paying for that overdesigned eyesore? How about looking at it? How about moving the couch out from the wall so the dang thing will fit back there?

rlpb• 16 years ago

> The only real time it's a slight issue/pain is when you go on a plane and the cables take up a bit of space.

I prefer the UK plug too. But you missed one other very important point of pain: the pain of standing on one. As the flex on a UK plug leaves from the bottom, it has the unique property of tending to lay down on the floor with pins facing upwards.

felxh• 16 years ago

Why would the only choice to replace the huge UK plugs be US plugs? This one might make much more sense for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schuko given the specs (much smaller, all the same advantages expect being fused - if I understand correctly) and also given the UKs geographic location ;)

qntm• 16 years ago

Do US plugs actually spark? I thought that was something you just saw in movies.

CrLf• 16 years ago

Most appliances are fused internally anyway.

tel• 16 years ago

Why not have socket fuses like you can find in bathrooms sometimes? I'm not arguing history, instead I'm just curious if there's some latent advantage to putting that hardware into the plug. All I can see are losses in convenience, duplication of effort, and weakened robustness.

almost• 16 years ago

Different plugs will have different fuses appropriate to the type of device. I have no idea how much of a benefit this is but you couldn't do that if the fuses were in the socket.

lutorm• 16 years ago

Why would 2x20A wires use less copper than a 40A one? Current capacity is a function of the cross-sectional area.

Or did you mean that you only need to run one set of wire instead of multiple ones to multiple outlets?

ramchip• 16 years ago

According to (http://www.faqs.org/faqs/electrical-wiring/part1/section-20....) and to the wiki article on wire gauges, 40A requires 8-gauge wire, which is 3.264mm in diameter, while 20A is 12-gauge, which is 2.054mm. The ratio of their cross-sectional area is 2.53; this justifies that the 40A wire conducts twice as much as the 20A but has 2.53 as much area, thus being more costly.

I'm not sure why. Is the skin effect sufficient to explain this?

kjuhygtfrde3• 16 years ago

Yes, a ring circuit you run a single wire around the room and back to the fuseboard. With a spur circuit you run a single wire to the furthest plug. In a typical room going back to the fuseboard isn't much further so it's not twice as much wire - more like 10% more

castis2• 16 years ago

Its my understanding that their electrical outlets are designed similar to a token ring network setup.

That uses way less cabling than any other network.

cstross2• 16 years ago

There's also a second reason British plugs are robust and fused: they're built to carry up to 3 kilowatts at 230 volts. (None of your wimpish American 110 volt mains juice here! Nothing quite makes your hair stand on end like accidentally touching a live pin carrying 230 volts and 13 amps ...)

To that end, the live and neutral contacts in a British socket are shuttered. The long earth pin on the plug makes contact before the live or neutral pins are in the socket, and once in contact, raises a shutter to permit live and neutral to make contact. And the nether regions of those pins are insulated so that if a plug is halfway into a socket and something bridges the pins, it can't make contact.

This is a great design -- for space heaters and ovens and server racks. It's a bit less useful for the low power consumption devices that have come to dominate the market (where maximum draw is well under 1Kw -- often under 0.1Kw).

camtarn• 16 years ago

It does, however, mean that any type of appliance that you might wish to plug in uses the same plug, regardless of what power level it wants - quite a good example of It Just Works, even if the price you pay is huge plugs.

Of course, that does break down a bit when you get to fuses, since you now have to worry about using different capacity fuses for appliances with different expected maximum power draw (3A for most things, 5A for the odd high-power small appliance, 13A for anything involving a heater...)

jergosh• 16 years ago

And the nether regions of those pins are insulated so that if a plug is halfway into a socket and something bridges the pins, it can't make contact.

That's not really true, you can still get electrocuted if you put you finger on both bolts.

And that plug is massive. Luckily you can use any sticklike thing to allow continental plugs to be inserted (which incidentally I'm doing right now -- hello from Edinburgh)

podperson2• 16 years ago

Australian plugs carry 15A at 240V and are nowhere near as horrible.

masklinn7• 16 years ago

> There's also a second reason British plugs are robust and fused: they're built to carry up to 3 kilowatts at 230 volts. (None of your wimpish American 110 volt mains juice here! Nothing quite makes your hair stand on end like accidentally touching a live pin carrying 230 volts and 13 amps ...)

Mainland european grounded plugs pretty much all handle 15A/230V, and none looks like a battlecruiser (see the well-known and widely used "CEE 7/7" aka "Type E/F hybrid": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CEE_7-7.jpg)

Hates_• 16 years ago

Previous discussions:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=927714

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=782236

samwillis• 16 years ago

That design has been around for a while now, I very much like it but I believe that they will find it very hard to have it CE marked. I work as a product designer in the UK and have been involved in the design of a device that plugs directly into a wall socket, the regulations on the design of the UK plug are very stringent and this probably doesn't pass. With that said though I think this is a very good design and would love it if the regulations were changed and this was achievable.

jacquesm13• 16 years ago

Brilliant design, but ganging up unfused plugs like that spells 'fire'.

It's like plugging in a cascade of extension cords.

I don't like the mobile pieces either, they are:

  - structurally fragile

  - likely to break off and decrease safety

  - in the case of the contacts a source of contact resistance
    which causes energy to be lost as well as an 
    increased fire risk

  - if they are 'wired' a spot where the wiring will break
    because of fatigue issues

Good industrial design takes in to account the function and safety issues as well.

Electrical plugs are a source of some amusement in Europe, in spite of being a 'union' we are not even capable of designing a plug that satisfies everybody and for some this has become symbolic of the dissent in the various states against EU conformity.

Have a look here how crazy the situation is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets

If we can't even design a common AC plug that everybody will actually adopt that's food for thought.

jacobolus• 16 years ago

Something to point to every time some European starts lecturing about the metric system or A paper sizes. Overcoming existing standards is damn hard, and it’s not just laziness or stupidity which prevents systemic standard changes.

ciupicri• 16 years ago

Except that the UK has to be a bit more "special" most of the time. For example it's not part of the Euro zone nor the Schengen area[2].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_zone#Members

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Area#EU_member_states_...

JoeAltmaier6• 16 years ago

NOt fair! Do you know they are "unfused", "fragile" or dangerous? You made that up!

As for ganging plugs, this approach has an advantage over other (e.g. American" standards - there is the possibility of keying the "ganged" plugs by rating, so for instance only 10-amp plugs could be ganged to the 40-amp main, thus preventing fusing issues.

jacquesm13• 16 years ago

The American plugs are no contest, they're junk. Just optimized for cost with terrible degradation as they get older, the same goes for the wall socket.

I've seen multiple blackened areas around wall sockets in relatively new houses in the US and Canada due to ridiculously high contact resistance.

The fuse in these plugs - assuming there is one - is in series with the consumer, not in series with the pass-through to the next plug, so yes, by ganging them up you're bypassing the fuses.

That's kind of logical too, otherwise you'd have to be matching the plugs in decreasing order of load (which in itself would not be a bad idea).

Fragile because they have moving parts, anybody that has any experience with electrical stuff knows that as soon as there are moving parts involved in something as basic as a connector that you're looking at an increased failure rate.

Dangerous because they allow the users a degree of freedom that has led to lots of trouble in the past, to the point that 'gangable' designs in plugs have been outlawed in lots of countries.

ErrantX4• 16 years ago

but ganging up unfused plugs like that spells 'fire'

Nah, it'll be fine. Actually this sort of thinking is probably because of the "dangerous plugs" pictures we are always shown as children. A stuffed up socket just looks automatically dangerous to us.

I guess you're coming from the perspective of overloading the socket. This is surprisingly hard to do - but you can do it equally well across multiple sockets (basically, if your fuse breaker is going to let it burn it doesn't care much where the devices are plugged in :)) so it is something of a misconception to consider a crowded socket particularly dangerous. People happily use an 8 gang extension cable without batting an eyelid.

More importantly having fuses in the plugs is unlikely to help all that much, the crucial fuse is the one in your circuit breaker. The current will divide across the sockets (my circuit theory is rusty so I won't try any figures :)) and it is the socket taking the brunt. While you would likely eventually see a spike that trips one of the plugs I'm betting the socket catching fire is more likely.

And, finally, I suspect these would be rated (well, if they weren't vapour-ware) for devices with internal fusing or low power draws. I'd also suspect that the plug "holder" would be fused.

BTW it is somewhat moot anyway because I believe those red tabs are a fuse holder :)

jacquesm13• 16 years ago

The big difference between a single 8 gang extension and this system is that you're putting all those connections in series, whereas in an 8 gang extension they're in parallel.

That's a lot of contact resistance, this socket already has twice as much contact resistance as a normal one (because of the twist in the contact section).

If we're talking 'light' consumers, say below a 100W or so you might get away with it but if a 'heavy' consumer would be plugged in as the last element in a series of 'light' ones you'd be concentrating an awful lot of energy in to a small spot.

But hey, what do I know about electricity ;)

At 10 mOhm (new and very clean) per contact with 5 plugs 'ganged' up that's 5x4x10mOhm or .2 Ohm. With a 240V working voltage and a 2 KW consumer that would be 8.3 Amps so about 1.6 V drop, 8.3x1.6=13 Watts, which the copper wiring alone can probably remove without any heat building up.

If the contacts wear and get older they could get to as much as .3 Ohm apiece. Now you're looking at 5x4x.3 Ohm, 6 Ohm, in total so that's a 49 V drop, almost 400 Watts to dissipate just in the contacts. That's a lot of heat.

That's why some older wall sockets will get warm (or even hot) when you plug in a large consumer.

And your circuit protection will not care even a little bit about all this, it's just another heater.

swombat2• 16 years ago

This thing comes up every 6-12 months on HN. Vaporware, from the looks of it.

Wake me up when it actually gets implemented and becomes available for real.

hellweaver666• 16 years ago

As I understand it, it's just a student project. It'll probably go commercial at some point, but not until the guy leaves uni.

makmanalp2• 16 years ago

Actually, the school will probably try to claim rights on it.

DevX101• 16 years ago

Unless I'm mistaken this community is about innovation. Making his prototype is a long way along the implementation process and beyond from 'pie in the sky' stage.

SeanLuke• 16 years ago

Any monkey can innovate. Watch while I innovate the following new word: gronkuiotis. What matters is not innovation but well-engineered ideas. That is, ideas which will work in reality rather than in gronkuiotis, I mean, design-world.

Now I happen to think that this project has some merit, though the rotation of the two main plugs will never pass muster -- it'll break quickly and at any rate almost certainly will rapidly become a fire hazard internally after a few turns. But that's probably fixable.

But what I think the GP was getting on about, and what also annoys me greatly as well, is that there are many "designers" (i.e. artists) who think that engineering is the easy part, and what really matters is "innovating". The mindset of "designers" goes like this. "Let me think of this cool version of a chair! Now I just need to find a lowly engineer to do the menial engineering part, I'm sure it's inconsequential." Design-first-engineer-second is how you wind up with poorly engineered "innovations" like these: http://www.strida.com/en/products/

The basic problem is that most artists have no training in making something which actually works. It's not sexy to get something to work. It's sexy to draw pretty pictures.

When I was a little kid I used to draw spaceships where a lightbulb was focused through a long series of lenses until it became stronger and stronger and was blasted out the back, Star Wars Propulsion style. I was quite the innovator, and had some awesome spaceships with impressive lens sequences. That didn't mean my idea contributed to the global discourse.

scott_s• 16 years ago

You're not wrong, but swombat has, like myself, seen this at least four times on HN already. So, we're not interested in it anymore until it's a product.

swombat2• 16 years ago

He was at the prototype stage last time, and the time before, and the time before... I don't think there has actually been any progress...

hackermom2• 16 years ago

They should just switch their infrastructure to the "Euro"-plug as soon as they can, like the rest of Europe already uses since ages. Not only is the "Euro"-plug by far the most solid, durable and safest plug, but it will help the Brits and the rest of Europe to be in-sync with eachother on the consumer electronics compatiblity front. Now that the UK has already taken the step to 230V like the rest of Europe, they should complete the rest of the move.

eru2• 16 years ago

It doesn't really matter. Adapters are cheap. (And I recently moved from the continent to Europe.)

com• 16 years ago

What does this mean?

"The continent" is normally - in English - a shortened form of "continental Europe". Are you saying that you moved from somewhere east of the Urals or perhaps Turkey (if you don't believe that that's culturally European, although the part west of the Bosphorus is indeed part of the continent).

And adaptors are pretty pricy for things with no active parts.

djhworld• 16 years ago

So you're suggesting changing every single plug socket in every house/business/office premises in the UK? Then changing every single plug on every appliance you own (or using a converter)

Seems like a huge undertaking to me.

RBerenguel• 16 years ago

It has happened in other countries and in other times. It may be called progress by some, even.

JoeAltmaier6• 16 years ago

OF course it would happen over time. ITs not any huge issue - certainly not bigger than the issue of selling different appliances every 1000 miles across Europe. Adapters are 10-cent items in bulk.

In America we have more than one standard we live with every day - two-prong plugs, 3-prong plugs, 220-volt plugs vs 110. You hardly every even think about it, except when you're shuffling through the pantry drawer, looking for an adapter.

points9• 16 years ago

The last thing we want is to be 'in sync' with Europe. We're British. Not European.

mhd2• 16 years ago

Safest? The euro plug is a compromise, so that it will fit in a wide variety of existing sockets, and the standard version isn't even grounded. It's mostly for pretty small devices.

There's IEC 60906-1, but I don't think any country ever adopted that.

It's much easier to unify currencies than to change every existing socket. As most adapters solve most of the problems, and it's easy to manufacture country-specific devices, this isn't really a big deal in my opinion.

hackermom2• 16 years ago

The 6-7 versions are all referred to as Europlug for some reason. The CEE7/7 is the grounded "compromise" one. This is the one I implied, which is the most common grounded connector in Europe today.

teamonkey2• 16 years ago

For longer than I can remember, it was very rare to find a European appliance that didn't work in the UK (and vice versa). The only recent developments have been in tighter regulation so that all electrical products produced in the UK must be guaranteed to work in Europe (and vice versa).

I don't think that Europlugs are more solid, durable or safer than British plugs either. Comparitively speaking, they're flimsy, unfused, unearthed and the wall sockets can't be made to close up without a plug inserted.

elblanco• 16 years ago

I've seen plenty Europlugs that close up without a plug in them. It can be a PIA when they fail to reopen without a lot of force!

masklinn7• 16 years ago

> They should just switch their infrastructure to the "Euro"-plug as soon as they can, like the rest of Europe already uses since ages.

The only "euro" plug (CEE 7/16) only handles 230V/2.5A, it was made to be compatible with every continental europe wallsocket (and low-power Class II appliances), not to work with big appliances.

The second most compatible european plug is probably the CEE 7/7[0] (Type E/F Hybrid), which combines the german "Schuko" plug and the french Type E, the Type F being widely used across continental europe, and the Type E adding a few more countries to the mix.

Past that, Switzerland, the Danemark and Italy have their own plugs (though according to Wikipedia, the Type E is now allowed in Danemark).

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Type...

points9• 16 years ago

Has anyone not seen this already?

It was posted on Reddit a few years ago. It's been posted on HN twice already, it's gone around twitter.

Are you all new to the internet?

gxti2• 16 years ago

Or perhaps they are less devoted than you to the church of HN. I'm flagging it, but not because I've seen it before (I have) but because of the hyperbolic title and writeup.

gamma_raj• 16 years ago

Beautiful design.

philwise• 16 years ago

Here is an alternative for the Duct Tape Programmer:

http://www.brightyellowcow.com/blog/A-thin-13A-Plug.html

confuzatron3• 16 years ago

That is quite dangerous, as it is unfused.

ashitvora• 16 years ago

Awesome.

podperson2• 16 years ago

My problem with this design is that it doesn't provide coverage for the pins making it less safe. A similar design which included the shield but tilted the pins could retain most of the safety characteristics of the standard design without being vulnerable to (say) kids sticking fingers near partially inserted pins.

elai• 16 years ago

I want the italian type L plugs, except it uses flat pins vs. rounded pins (rounded pins always seem to fall out at the slightest force, it's extremely frustrating) and have a plastic covering for part of the live wires like the british plugs do. Outlets would have 4 to 6 plugs standard instead of one or two. The Schuko plugs are huge monstrosities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Type...

RiderOfGiraffes• 16 years ago

Here are previous submissions so people can catch up on earlier discussions:

+ http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=841068

+ http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=927714 <- This one has some comments worth reading.

gcb• 16 years ago

very dandy but...

the female plugs in the adapter are not to spec to female outlet plugs. so it can't be legally sold there. (me thinks. in Brazil you can't sell outlet stuff that are not up to government spec)

no matter how well it fits or looks. Unless he managed to implement the shutter activated by the earth plug and minimum depths for the live contacts in that little box. Then i would be honestly impressed.

regularfry2• 16 years ago

    the female plugs in the adapter are not to spec to female
    outlet plugs. so it can't be legally sold there. (me thinks. 
    in Brazil you can't sell outlet stuff that are not up to 
    government spec)

That's not a problem in the UK. You can sell non-standard-shape plugs and sockets as long as they're up to the safety spec in all other respects. I believe that also means that they have to be sufficiently different from the standard ones that it's impossible to attempt to fit a standard plug into a non-standard socket (or vice versa).

tzs• 16 years ago

    Min-Kyu Choi impressed every passer by with
    his neat, apparently market-ready plug that
    folds down to the width of an Apple MacBook Air.

Considering that a MacBook Air is 32.5 cm (12.74 inches) wide, I'm not impressed.

masklinn7• 16 years ago

Have you ever held an english plug in your hands? These things are closer to a battle tank than an AC power plug. Forget about flimsy american crap, english plugs can be used as assault weapons.

robin_reala• 16 years ago

Growing up with a younger brother I can testify to this last statement.

Brilliant design: RCA student radically improves the UK plug

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