Charging phones and cameras in London

For the most part, all electronics and phones anymore are 110V-240V compatible. Check on your charger for the item and the voltage should be listed. In that case all that is needed is an adapter so you can plug in.

More info here: http://www.ricksteves.com/travel-tips/phones-tech/electric-adapters-converters

No, you don't need a voltage converter, on modern chargers for phones, cameras etc, there should be written on the charger 240v-110v (or something simi!lar), you only need the plug adapter.

You need to do some homework, Larry.

This isn't a rare question here so a dive into your guidebook or looking around this website will take you down the well trodden path.

You need to dig out every one of electrical and electronic device you want to take on the trip, find the printed information on the charger or brick or the specification plate which will read, generally, either 100-250 vAC 50/60Hz or maybe 115 vAC 60Hz, make a note of each one and come back and tell us what you found. Are they all the same, or similar, or is there one or two different from the others?

And before we can say where to get what you need, wll you be starting from Missouri?

My only advice is to make sure the adapter you get is compatible in the UK.....when we were there 4 years ago, the adapters needed for the UK were different than the ones we needed for Europe.

"My only advice is to make sure the adapter you get is compatible in the UK.....when we were there 4 years ago, the adapters needed for the UK were different than the ones we needed for Europe."

Also to be UK legal, they should have sleeved + & - pins and also be fused.

harley,

"they should have sleeved + & - pins"

Could you clarify the reference to + and -. Are the pins not labeled "L" and "N". + / - is normally only used with direct current circuits.

Not all Plug Adaptors sold in North America are sleeved, but these ones appear to be......

http://www.magellans.com/itemdy00.aspx?ID=118,3681&T1=MEA33MCG

I've never seen any Adaptors that were fused, but most power points (outlets) that I've encounted in the U.K. have had both a Fuse and a Switch.

Yes, L & N ( as a maintenance electrician I tend to used both terms interchangeably). UK wall sockets are usually protected by a 32 amp fuse/MCB as we use ring circuits rather than radial circuits ( more common on the continent ) which are rated at 16 amp. Because the ring circuit is rated so high, that is the reason that UK 3 pin plugs have fuses inside them, consequently foreign plugs aren't fused, that's why the plug adapter needs to be.
In reality though, if you only going to plug very low amperage devices such as cameras/phones/iPods into the plug adapter, it shouldn't be a problem.

Yes the two pins are Live and Neutral, NOT '+' and '-'. The supply is 200-240V 50 Hz AC.

Ken, in the UK plugs normally have individual fuses. not sockets. Modern plugs have to be sleeved. The fuse is because many sockets are fed through one cable from the main fusebox, which only has a large value fuse. Some people consider the fuse in the plug over-engineering, but it is still in the requirements.
But, yes, some adaptors omit the fuse, so technically, you should not use them, but plenty of people do.

The adapter linked to fails UK codes on two further points in addition to the lack of a fuse. Firstly the live and neutral pins are too close to the outer part of the casing. Secondly the socket for putting the plug in to it is not shuttered.

The UK is a country where safe compliant adaptors for visitors' plugs are widely available on the high street in variety stores such as Wilkos, and are no more expensive than non compliant ones sold outside the UK and online.

harley / Chris / Marco,

Thanks for the clarification of the plug designs. I also worked in the electrical trades for many years, and while I'm more familiar with the standards here, I did some research on the systems used in other countries prior to travelling across the pond for the first time. I was quite surprised when I first learned about the ring circuits used in the U.K., but I suppose there are some benefits to that system.

None of the U.K. Plug Adaptors commonly sold here appear to be equipped with fuses (or at least none that I've seen so far), so most of us just have to use the models that we can get. These are usually sufficient for the typical "tourist uses" with current draw measured in milliamps. The majority of power points / outlets that I've encountered in the U.K. have been fused, so having another fuse in the plug would seem to be unnecessary.

One good feature of the U.K. outlets that's not as common here is the shutters which are opened by the ground pin. Good safety feature! I've started seeing a few Power Bars here with shutters, but they're are not common in wall outlets.

Thanks for the reminder about the "proper" Plug Adaptors available on High Street. I may be getting back to the U.K. this year, so I'll be sure to pick some up.

"The majority of power points / outlets that I've encountered in the U.K. have been fused, so having another fuse in the plug would seem to be unnecessary."

Ken, not sure what you mean there, there's no fuse inside the wall socket and as mentioned ring mains are rated at 32 amp, that's why UK plugs have a 2, 3, 5, 7, 10 or 13 amp fuse inside. Are you talking about a "fused spur", where the power lead is hard wired into the socket, they have an internal fuse.

The reason for ring mains being the standard in the UK was to reduce the amount of copper used for the same delivery capacity. Rather important immediately post war. There are some other advantages, but also drawbacks, but even now totally non-ring installations are rare.

Other countries using the same plug and socket standards do not have ring mains where use of unfused adaptors may be perfectly safe, but this is not the case in the UK, and to a lesser extent Ireland where radial wiring is more common, but this is not discernible at a casual glance.

It is of great concern to Universities with overseas students bringing these adaptors in - there have been cases of fires caused by them. With low current devices this may be unlikely, but the sub-standard adaptors themselves particularly those designed for a lot of inputs don't tend to work well with poor connections.

harley,

THE photo on this website shows the type of power point that I was referring to. The ones I've seen in hotel rooms have also had a fuse. I realize this is not the typical outlet that might be installed in a kitchen or whatever, something like in THIS photo where a fused plug would be important.

Marco,

Thanks for the information on the background on ring circuits. I can certainly appreciate the need to conserve copper, especially after the war. At the time of the war, the electrical standards here were already somewhat entrenched, so the radial "branch circuit" method continued to be used.

It's also interesting about the Universities being concerned with Plug Adaptors used by foreign students, and I'm sure they have good reason to be concerned. Many of the typical cheap travel Plug Adaptors on the market these days are made offshore, not particularly good quality, and often only have a current rating of a few amps. That shouldn't normally be a problem when connecting only a single solid-state charger to it, however if the user decides to attach a power bar and connect several devices including high wattage hair dryers or whatever, that's not a good situation. Unfortunately the average user doesn't have the technical background to know that's not a good practice.

For those that must use Voltage Converters, many are not aware that these devices are in most cases not rated for continuous duty operation and therefore shouldn't be left connected for long periods of time (especially when one is not in the room). I'm sure that's in the ratings somewhere, but most people don't read the "fine print". I make it a habit to not leave chargers of any kind connected any longer than absolutely necessary, even if they are rated for continuous duty (even the chargers supplied by my camera manufacturer).

Unfortunately there's a lot of rubbish on the internet, which is usually the first place people look when they're seeking "definitive information" on subjects of this type. I was reading one website recently that was comparing solid-state voltage converters (switch mode power supplies) with transformers, and they considered the transformer "more complex". I'm not sure how they reached that conclusion as there's nothing simpler than a transformer.

Interesting discussion......

Ken the photo you posted is a British plug and socket.
The fuse is in the plug, you can see it in the black plug. The socket has a switch BUT DOES NOT HAVE A FUSE. Some sockets have a switch, but not all.
One thing you can see with the black plug, is that it has a plastic earth pin. This must be for a low power appliance which does not need an earth connection. The earth pin is still needed to open the safety shuuters in the socket, as explained above,

Ken, as said the photo you posted is a standard 2 gang wall socket (fuse in the plug), I thought when you said fused socket, you were thinking about a fused spur, one of these:
http://www.wirelesslightingstore.com/user/products/large/FC277.JPG

harley,

The photo that I posted of the outlet was the closest one I could find to the outlet I remembered. I've been scouring my photo files to try and find the picture, but haven't located it yet. I'm sure the one I'm remembering had a fuse. The hotel I was staying in was older, so perhaps all the wiring wasn't "current"?

Chris F.,

I was aware the outlet in the photo didn't have a fuse, but it's the closest photo I could find. I knew about the ground pin opening the shutters as I mentioned above ("One good feature of the U.K. outlets that's not as common here is the shutters which are opened by the ground pin").

If I ever do find the photo, I'll be sure to post the link.

I also take a power strip since we always have several devices to charge and it packs easy.