In article
,
wrote:
No, my beef is not with 220/240 volt distribution-I prefer it. It's
the goofy room wiring in loops and the goofy sockets the Brits use I
think are ridiculous.

You need to look up fires caused by poorly specified house distribution
systems in the US, before criticising the UK. It is many times worse than
here.

--
*I used to have an open mind but my brains kept falling out *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Jan 3, 6:21*am, "Jerry" wrote:
"Geoffrey S. Mendelson" wrote in ...

snip
: The UK used several systems, and a friend of mine who traveled
to London
: in the 1970's found that there were four different electrical
systems in use
: in various parts of the city. By that time they had been
standardized to
: 240 volts 50Hz, but the older plugs and lightbulbs (different
ones for
: different systems) remained.

Hmm, surely the 1970s were a tad late for different voltages
(certainly for London), the national grid had been started long
before WW2 and was complete not long after, are you are not
thinking of the different designs of electrical circuits and
sockets in use or perhaps a different time period?

I suppose that some building with their own (derived/generated)
power supplies might have had (still have) 'odd' systems to suit
their own needs, an exception rather than the rule.
--
Regards, Jerry.

A national grid has no need to standardize end user voltages, only
frequency.

Many different HV line voltages are used: houses and small businesses
get their power off a "pole pig" or a ground mounted transformer. They
always have trim windings and somewhere in the system must be a tap
changer setup because I2R losses change over the day as the power
demands vary widely.

It would be possible to have 220 in Northern England, 240 in Scotland
and 230-or 117, or 277, or any number at all-in Southampton. because
off a stepdown transformer you are rarely going more than 500 meters
to 1 km, usually less.

Switchmode equipment doesn't care. Solid state analog equipment is
regulated and has a design input range, power amps are often
unregulated and just make less power at lower line voltage. Tube
(valve) equipment wants its heaters at bogey voltage. In the case of
tungsten filaments on transmitting tubes it needs to be close to spot
on.

In article
,
wrote:
n Britain one may readily obtain a "site transformer" which will
give what is advertised as 110 volt balanced power. I haven't been
there in 20+ years, can any Brits tell me if that's really true or if
120, or more, or less, is actually common? They are used for electric
drills and whatnot outdoors. Vintage US gear works fine at 110, but
mostly not current stuff.

110 volt via an isolating transformer is used on building sites etc for
all power tools. Purely for safety reasons.

--
*I'm pretty sure that sex is better than logic, but I can't prove it.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Jan 4, 2:06*am, "David Looser" wrote:
"Jerry" wrote



Not very often, just as kids in areas that do not use the UK's
BS1363 plug/socket don't tend to poke things into other types of
sockets, why because they are *taught* not to whilst being
supervised, of course that is to hard for average UK parents to
manage so the state has to hold their hands so to speak!

And with that paragraph you have blown any credibility you might have hoped
to acquire!

David.

Making things idiotproof makes better idiots.

The British nanny state is disgusting, dysgenic and depressing but
the US is headed in the exact same direction. The only bright spot is
that when WE implode our empire as you did yours (and, sadly, we
helped: Enoch Powell was oh so correct to hate us for that, although I
was not born when the stuff started and a seven year old when it
pretty much ended: we visited your lily pad back then and it was still
pounds, shillings, pence and no one could make change) the entire
economic system is coming down too and it will have to end pretty much
all over the West.

So don't take my comments the wrong way. We're _worse_ than you are
because we have the example of the mother country at our nose and
we're doing it anyway. God Save the Queen.

On Jan 4, 5:27*am, Terry Casey wrote:
In article ,
says...



In message , Geoffrey S.
Mendelson writes:

The UK used several systems, and a friend of mine who traveled to London
in the 1970's found that there were four different electrical systems in use
in various parts of the city. By that time they had been standardized to
240 volts 50Hz, but the older plugs and lightbulbs (different ones for
different systems) remained.

Your friend sounds confused. The 240/50 was standardised a long time
before 1970, and the various plugs and bulbs had been running on 240/50
for some decades by then.

I remember a major upgrade taking place in West Ham to upgrade the
distribution network from 215V AC to the standard 240V while I was at
school there in the late 50s.

Nearby Ilford still had 200V DC, a hangover from when Ilford town
council generated 600V DC for its tramways and obviously found it
convenient to stick to DC for domestic supplies.

When it was converted to 240V AC I do not know but there was no evidence
of anything remotely DC connected when I moved there in the early 70s.

In the US there were 25 Hz buildings and even houses as late as the
early 70s and a few DC apartment and office buildings in New York
later than that. I stayed at a swank highrise in Chicago in the early
70s that was AC by then but was originally DC and there was evidence
of it in the labels tacked in the fuse box.

We also had a little 50 Hz before the war.

I've always wanted to do a full study of DC and odd frequency power
historically in the US but the research is not helped by the
electrical utilities. I think they are ashamed of it.

On Jan 27, 6:25*pm, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:
In article
,
* wrote:

*No, my beef is not with 220/240 volt distribution-I prefer it. It's
the goofy room wiring in loops and the goofy sockets the Brits use I
think are ridiculous.

You need to look up fires caused by poorly specified house distribution
systems in the US, before criticising the UK. It is many times worse than
here.

In the US, electrical house fires are mostly a result of incompetent
DIY wiring or failed appliances......or arson.

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
: In article
:
,
: wrote:
: No, my beef is not with 220/240 volt distribution-I prefer
it. It's
: the goofy room wiring in loops and the goofy sockets the
Brits use I
: think are ridiculous.
:
: You need to look up fires caused by poorly specified house
distribution
: systems in the US, before criticising the UK. It is many times
worse than
: here.
:

But that is not caused but the use of radial circuits (opposed to
a ring circuit), it's the poor hardware (fittings and conductor)
used that causes the problem. If radial circuits were a fire
hazard, never mind actually being the cause of fires, then just
about every film/TV studio, theatre and other entertainment
venues that have a fixed lighting rig would either have burnt
down or been shut down on H&S grounds!

There is nothing wrong with radial circuits, the only two down
sides are amount of cabling needed and the size of the breaker
panel - IIRC ring circuits were introduced into the UK in an
attempt to save on cabling, due to cost. Radial circuits are
still, to this day, permitted.
--
Regards, Jerry.

In article
,
wrote:
You need to look up fires caused by poorly specified house
distribution systems in the US, before criticising the UK. It is many
times worse than here.

In the US, electrical house fires are mostly a result of incompetent
DIY wiring or failed appliances......or arson.


One of the major reasons is those 'wire nuts' oh so common, and banned
over here many many years ago.

--
*Some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article
,
wrote:
and it was still
pounds, shillings, pence and no one could make change

In the days of lsd, the average person could do rudimentary mental
arithmetic. These days most need a calculator, even although a base 10
system makes things simpler.

But of you're so dismissive of a non decimal currency, why does the US
stick to imperial measurements for just about everything else?

--
*Not all men are annoying. Some are dead.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
Jerry wrote:
: You need to look up fires caused by poorly specified house
distribution
: systems in the US, before criticising the UK. It is many times
worse than
: here.
:

But that is not caused but the use of radial circuits (opposed to
a ring circuit), it's the poor hardware (fittings and conductor)
used that causes the problem. If radial circuits were a fire
hazard, never mind actually being the cause of fires, then just
about every film/TV studio, theatre and other entertainment
venues that have a fixed lighting rig would either have burnt
down or been shut down on H&S grounds!

Radial circuits cost more to install. Which means in practice using the
cheapest possible materials on components where they are available. And
having fewer outlets due again to cost. Resulting in the use of extension
leads or bodged extra sockets.

There is nothing wrong with radial circuits, the only two down
sides are amount of cabling needed and the size of the breaker
panel - IIRC ring circuits were introduced into the UK in an
attempt to save on cabling, due to cost. Radial circuits are
still, to this day, permitted.

No **** Sherlock.

--
*Everyone has a photographic memory. Some don't have film *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.