Fastest solution to fix US problems (most of them) would be to do it like in almost every EU country recess sockets by 1 cm and everyone is safe and happy (applies to 3 pin sockets only, 2pin ones in US are just to loose like the ones in the red light district ) and also ban 2 pin crap...
The thing about the US plugs is they actually need the large contact area due to the high current and low voltage.
I've had an idea for a plug that is three rings each inside each other, with the middle ring being live, the next larger ring being neutral, and the largest ring being ground. This would allow for a VERY compact plug, it could be made out of sheet metal instead of other standards which require die pressing or other manufacturing standards. It could be designed with a twist lock connector that would turn on the power when locked, and only when locked. This means that you don't need to shutter or sleeve the outlets and plugs respectively, as it would require the plug to be fully inserted and twisted in order for power to be applied.
This would eliminate almost any and all problems with current standards
It would eliminate the bulk of the UK standard.
It would be polarized unlike the CEE standard
It would be better in every single way shape and respect to the NEMA standard.
I should probably make a good drawing of this, and I have posted this idea to the forum before.
The first thing I thought of when reading your description was powerCON...
http://www.neutrik.com/en/audio/powercon/
This is another article on the subject. Its still not clear exactly what happened though.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4322932/Man-32-dies-charging-iPhone-bath.html
, but the cable wasn't near the bath, it had been run there to charge a mobile phone.
'The extension cable was on the floor and it appeared as though he had his phone charger on his chest and the part between the phone charger and the cable had made contact with the water.'
The extension cable was run across the floor and it appeared as though he had his phone charger on his chest and the join between the phone charger and the cable had made contact with the water.
Its always worth remembering the rest of the world does NOT have the standards for electrical safety we expect in 1st World countries, and the standards they do have are often only enforced if someone important gets killed. You don't need to go further afield than the average UK or US package holiday to find potentially lethal wiring if you stray from the resort hotels that have been checked by the tour operators.
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I've done a tad bit more than a napkin drawing and made a real quick 3D model using Roblox (Not the best 3D modeling tool, but it's the only one I know how to use)
I've exported it to OBJ, here it is.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/8awcejv99jgiuql/obj.zip?dl=1 (Direct link)
Some pictures if you, like me, can't figure out what the hell to do with a 3D model:
http://prntscr.com/em2f03
http://prntscr.com/em2f26
http://prntscr.com/em2f4o
In order from smallest ring to largest ring, there is Live (In the direct center), Neutral (In the second largest ring), and Ground (The largest ring)
There is a plastic bump on the top that is supposed to insert into a notch in the socket, and when turned it would hit a microswitch and turn on the power. Two or more bumps/notches could be added for better locking and stability.
This way, the outlet wouldn't need a shutter, and the plug wouldn't need a sleeve. The power is off until the specially shaped notch is turned and hits a specially shaped microswitch in the socket. So you can stick whatever you want in the outlet, and won't get zapped.
The model isn't to scale by any means. I haven't done any real world measurements or anything, it's just to illustrate the concept.
This adds a layer of safety, at the cost of redoing the world with a more complex design. And you still could argue that a shutter would make it still safer because the microswitch could conceivably fail closed.
While this thread is about someone who died in something that was probably related to standard power plugs, the existing designs, both US and European are obviously not terribly unsafe. The death rates are low. Even anecdotally related accidents with metal objects falling across improperly exposed pins didn't have lethal or even serious results. No argument that it couldn't have been worse, but the reality is that it wasn't, and isn't very often.
Perhaps the existing designs are good enough.
That definitely qualifies for a Darwin award.
I did find that odd when I visited the UK, no electrical outlets or switches anywhere in bathrooms, the only thing they did have was an isolated 110V shaver socket. Here in the US I don't think I've ever seen a bathroom that didn't have an outlet in it and most of the time the light switch is inside the bathroom too. Houses from the 1950s often have the bathroom light switch outside the door, something that amused me when I was about 4 years old turning the light off while someone was in there.
Tragic story, yes. But it could be worse. He could have been found in the bath with a mains wired breadboad on his chest and a Ben Heck video playing on the tele...
Quote'The extension cable was on the floor and it appeared as though he had his phone charger on his chest and the part between the phone charger and the cable had made contact with the water.'
Crappy writing style makes this less clear than it should, allow me to fix.QuoteThe extension cable was run across the floor and it appeared as though he had his phone charger on his chest and the join between the phone charger and the cable had made contact with the water.
The media reports are somewhat fuzzy, but if the charger was on his chest, then a mains socket was on his chest.
Interesting would not think a 5vdc source would cause death, wonder if this only applies to cheap Chinese adapters that have no isolation.
According to the story the man rested a 240 V mains extension cable on his chest and then submerged it in the water. Nothing close to 5 V DC.
(It should be noted that he would have had to use a long extension cable to do this as UK electrical regulations do not permit mains sockets anywhere near a bathtub.)
Oh yikes, I thought they meant the phone charger cable not the 240v one. Yeah that would pack a nice punch.
The posters on the Snopes message board don't appear to have electrical engineering knowledge to any greater degree than the muppets on the Craigslist message boards. It's not a truly reliable source of information, like, say, the Straight Dope.
As for GFCI sockets, they do not "detect if something has fallen in the water" and that is not their purpose. You can chop off a cordset, dangle it in the water, and plug it in to a GFCI and nothing will trigger it, unless the water has dissolved electrolytes.
As a qualifier to the above, the US type of GFCI can be triggered by dipping bare wires into a bathtub with a (grounded) metal drain. The wires need to be stripped so as to expose a fairly large area to the water; a chopped-off cord shows no response.
The posters on the Snopes message board don't appear to have electrical engineering knowledge to any greater degree than the muppets on the Craigslist message boards. It's not a truly reliable source of information, like, say, the Straight Dope.The combination of a set of photos showing the infamous pool + flipflops + extension lead being set up (you have to script a set of URLs for the photos as the directory listing is denied) + the distance from any of the buildings where the red lead could possibly be connected + the fact that the participants appear to be the teardown team after an IT event at the Northwood-LAN Frag Arena, and appear to be the right age range to be uni students, put the probability of fakery at 99.99%
This adds a layer of safety, at the cost of redoing the world with a more complex design. And you still could argue that a shutter would make it still safer because the microswitch could conceivably fail closed.
While this thread is about someone who died in something that was probably related to standard power plugs, the existing designs, both US and European are obviously not terribly unsafe. The death rates are low. Even anecdotally related accidents with metal objects falling across improperly exposed pins didn't have lethal or even serious results. No argument that it couldn't have been worse, but the reality is that it wasn't, and isn't very often.
Perhaps the existing designs are good enough.
My thoughts exactly. This seems like a very over-engineered design, a complex solution looking for a problem. While the US style plugs are probably some of the least safe in the developed world, it's not as though people are constantly electrocuting themselves just trying to plug stuff in. Most electrocutions are caused by people doing stupid things, case in point the incident that started the thread. Try to make something idiot proof and someone will find a better idiot. I don't even like the tamper resistant receptacles they require now for domestic use, they're expensive and only available in the crappy builder grade. It's difficult to get some plugs into them and even harder to probe with a multimeter or circuit tester. I can only imagine what a mechanically complex receptacle containing multiple microswitches would cost, not to mention the cost of adapters that would be needed for the decades long transition. I mean there are still millions of houses out there with ungrounded 2-prong receptacles and those have not been used in new construction in ~50 years.
If people were being electrocuted left and right by the mains connectors used in the US, then something along these lines might be justified. Since that is not presently the case
If people were being electrocuted left and right by the mains connectors used in the US, then something along these lines might be justified. Since that is not presently the case
Very quickly acquired numbers:
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the USA, 2010: 160 (I excluded the lightning deaths, there were three.)
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the UK, 2010: 6.
That's about three times higher per capita. Seems to me there's substantial room for improvement.
If people were being electrocuted left and right by the mains connectors used in the US, then something along these lines might be justified. Since that is not presently the case
Very quickly acquired numbers:
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the USA, 2010: 160 (I excluded the lightning deaths, there were three.)
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the UK, 2010: 6.
That's about three times higher per capita. Seems to me there's substantial room for improvement.
If people were being electrocuted left and right by the mains connectors used in the US, then something along these lines might be justified. Since that is not presently the case
Very quickly acquired numbers:
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the USA, 2010: 160 (I excluded the lightning deaths, there were three.)
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the UK, 2010: 6.
That's about three times higher per capita. Seems to me there's substantial room for improvement.I'm not sure that workplace deaths is a good comparator because the health and safety elves will have more influence there which might mitigate unreliable design in the socket itself. H&S might also (possibly) have more influence in the UK than in the US.
The more interesting figure is the number of non-fatal shocks which is reckoned to be 2.5 millionwith 350k serious injuries - I'd hazard the suggestion that finding comparable numbers for the 'states would be more illuminating.
If people were being electrocuted left and right by the mains connectors used in the US, then something along these lines might be justified. Since that is not presently the case
Very quickly acquired numbers:
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the USA, 2010: 160 (I excluded the lightning deaths, there were three.)
Electrically-related workplace deaths in the UK, 2010: 6.
That's about three times higher per capita. Seems to me there's substantial room for improvement.
I think it has to do everything with the plugs used in the USA. The first time I saw it in action, my reaction was this: The wiring code, the low voltage, the lack of grounding in too many equipment and plug... they all lead to problems like this. The strange thing, people go crazy when there is a plane accident in a decade, and let this ignorance kill many more people.
But you know, dont listen to the rest of the world, because, everything which is not a V8 4L car is a communist car.
It was just the first set of numbers I found.
QuoteThe more interesting figure is the number of non-fatal shocks which is reckoned to be 2.5 millionwith 350k serious injuries - I'd hazard the suggestion that finding comparable numbers for the 'states would be more illuminating.
Non-fatal data is harder to come by and difficult to compare, as there's no requirement to record such data - deaths go down on a coroners report, not so much burnt fingers.