Re: upside down????

[Graham.]

The Chinese seem to believe our sockets are orientated earth-pin down. I have several Chinese wall-warts that have their rating labels upside-down.

[TimW]

Did you have your head a long way back in the chair? Had they administered gas and air? What was on the telly? Was it flashbacks of your life?

I too have had that experience.

TW

[Harry Bloomfield]

on 06/06/2019, Jim GM4DHJ ... supposed :

No reason why not and sensible if the flex exits up from the socket.

[Ian Jackson]

In message <rdaKE.1993503$ [e-mail], Jim GM4DHJ ... [e-mail] writes

Many years ago, I was led to understand that having the earth pin uppermost meant that if the plug is not fully inserted, anything thin and metallic drops into the gap, it hits the earth first (and probably only the earth). But of course, for many years UK plugs have had sleeved pins, so there is little danger regardless of how the socket is orientated.

While UK sockets have normally been 'earth up', this is not so for some other countries - notably the USA, which is 'earth down'. To make matters worse, the pins are not (and probably can't really be) sleeved.

[newshound]

Perhaps the worst thing about that might be that condensation (or splashing) on the wires could run down into the plug.

[Richard]

... to 10 inches rather than the usual three.

[Ian Jackson]

In message <qdd43s$khs$ [e-mail], Graham. [e-mail] writes

That's so when the socket is near the floor, you don't have to lie on the floor to read them. Instead, you stand with your back near the wall, bend forwards 90 degrees, and look down on them. The writing is then the right way up for you.

[John Rumm]

Yup. Sometimes it makes sense to go for an orientation other than the normal.

[Graham.]

Arso! Confucius he say your glass half full.

[whisky-dave]

I've seen those sorts of videos is that why you rarely see male dental assistants ?

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

bona...tee hee

[Brian Gaff]

I don't see why not, you don't say if they are switched. Plugs and sockets are not exactly waterproof either way up but if a blind person turned it off and turned it on instead that could be a little confusing. I guess somebody else has wondered if it was an Australian Electrician? Brian

[Brian Gaff]

Yes and the cable out of the other side. If you look carefully at these, there is normally a flat twistable plate on the bottom containing the pins and one can simply twist it off and twist on one for another land entirely, as the ground is at the bottom in effect they assume all sockets are earth down of course. Some of course do not even bother with the earth simply putting in a plastic pin instead. Brian

[Brian Gaff]

That was the old excuse why pinhole camera images were upside down. Brian

[Terry Casey]

I've seen one or two of those but they are rare.

If the device doesn't require an earth you don't need a metal pin but the plastic pin has to be present to open the shutters on a 13A socket.

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

switched twin powerpoints ....

[Jim GM4DHJ ...]

which is a pain as they seem to break off too easily .....

[Steve Walker]

I've just looked and MK seem to have changed their socket design to a more conventional one. They used to use a shutter mechanism that turned around a pivot point between the live and neutral pins and had ramps in opposite directions on the two holes, so they didn't need an earth pin to open them.

SteveW

[PeterC]

When they came out they were claimed to be child-proof (OK, would need a lot of force to get a child in there!), but were a lot easier to probe due to there being no shutter as such. Instead of a screwdriver to operate the shutter it was simple to twist the plate with the probes. Electrak were a different matter (good idea but in some situations having to turn the plugs was awkward). We fitted Electrak to stop the cleaners from unplugging the computers to plug in their polishers.

[tabbypurr]

The point of MK's earthless shutters was to stop insertion of French 2 pin plugs. They were also less trivial to defeat, and used less plastic.

NT