The thing with electrical plus is that they should be designed around safety first, rather than convenience. And the U.K. plug is a lot more safety focused than many other plug standards.
The advantage of the U.K. plug is that live pins are physically blocked and only released when the Earth pin is present. This is why the Earth pin is slightly longer on U.K. plugs and why insulated devices have a plastic Earth pin rather than no pin at all. The advantage of this is so you cannot jam things into them (either accidentally or intentionally) without the Earth pin. Thus making the plug much safer.
I’ve found U.K. plugs to be much more secure inside the socket too. US plugs often come away from the wall when there is a little bit of weight or tension on the plug. U.K. plugs require a great deal more pressure to come loose from the socket.
If I were to bring this back to types I’d say one needs to evaluate what the requirements are: safety or convenience.
When I was a kid before we had legos we had some soviet alternative called constructor or something. Everything was made from metal, crews etc. obviously as a kid one of the first “hello world” things you will build is “plug” that you can insert into those holes in the wall. My older brother was lucky when he did it as the fuse in the house went off. My younger brother did the same about a decade later but holding in his hand two metal pins. He was also lucky that my dad was just passing through corridor and pushed him out. He got away with just burned skin on the fingers and a bit of shock.
Regular Meccano could played with this way too. Albeit I don't know if the pieces are shaped right to fit into a plug socket. But I'd wager that's more by accident than design
And now try the Schuko, which improves on all metrics you named (except the polarity isn't fixed, that's its one theoretical disadvantage), but also significantly improves usability (you can plug it in either way, the plug goes in much easier, and it stays in with much more force)
It’s a good design but I disagree that it improves on all the safety features. For starts the child proof safety shutters are still only optional in some regions.
> except the polarity isn't fixed, that's its one theoretical disadvantage
Polarity isn’t fixed on any mains sockets. That’s why the A in AC stands for “alternating”
And yet there is a big difference between the hot and neutral conductors in a 120V outlet in the US. The neutral remains close to ground potential, and is actually bonded to earth at the breaker panel.
I’ll admit that my understanding of these things is rather superficial. I might understand more than the average person but that’s not exactly a high bar to set.
However I always understood potential to be different to polarity. And that AC (which, to my knowledge, all electric grids globally carry) is the literal oscillation of polarity. What am I missing/misunderstanding from the GPs post?
English isn’t my native language, so I mixed up those two terms.
But that’s what I meant, the UK and US plugs (as well as switzerland I think?) theoretically have one pin always be hot, one always be neutral.
With Schuko, you can reverse the plug, and it'll still work, which is on the one hand awesome when you've got a tight space and want more plugs to fit, but can also require higher costs, as you've always got to switch both wires instead of just switching the hot one (although this is best practices everywhere, as you can never know how well the electrician followed specs when wiring your apartment 90 years ago).
The transformer on the pole delivers 240V rms center tapped, with the center tap being connected to ground at the pole. The center tap wire is actually uninsulated, and the two hots are wrapped around it for support. The center tap is connected to the neutral bus at the breaker panel.
Half the breakers are connected to one hot, and half are connected to the other hot. For 120V you wire hot/neutral to the receptacle, while for 240V you wire hot/hot. (Plus ground, of course.)
In the EU, receptacles are wired hot/hot, and there is no neutral conductor.
Thanks for the EU detail! Are you saying the typical house in the EU has three phase power delivered to it? All three phases?
Here in the US, where split-phase is the residential standard, a house with three phase is quite rare. The HV lines running on poles in a neighborhood are mostly single phase, at least in rural areas like mine.
> Thanks for the EU detail! Are you saying the typical house in the EU has three phase power delivered to it? All three phases?
Yes! And many electrical devices rely on it, though sometimes fallback to regular 230V single-phase at 32A is possible, e.g. for stoves.
And considering a typical stove runs at 11-15kW and a typical electric water heater between 15kW to 25kW, you'll need it as otherwise you'll need far higher amps than is reasonable.
Honestly, only due to the technology connections video did I realize that the US does not use triphase power in most homes, which was genuinely surprising.
Although I use a propane range, I'm wired for a 240V 30A electric one. That's only 7.2KW. My water heater is also propane.
I have a friend with a Bridgeport vertical mill in his garage/workshop. He had to build a single phase to three phase converter, so he could run its three phase motors.
It's true that EU plugs of some devices can be a bit loose; especially 2-pin variants where the wall socket is not indented or the indent is taller than the plug.
The advantage of the U.K. plug is that live pins are physically blocked and only released when the Earth pin is present. This is why the Earth pin is slightly longer on U.K. plugs and why insulated devices have a plastic Earth pin rather than no pin at all. The advantage of this is so you cannot jam things into them (either accidentally or intentionally) without the Earth pin. Thus making the plug much safer.
I’ve found U.K. plugs to be much more secure inside the socket too. US plugs often come away from the wall when there is a little bit of weight or tension on the plug. U.K. plugs require a great deal more pressure to come loose from the socket.
If I were to bring this back to types I’d say one needs to evaluate what the requirements are: safety or convenience.