First time going to England with the RS group. Can someone please help me with the difference between an adapter and converter for the outlets there? Which one would I need, especially for charging phones with a cord?
Also, someone on another post here mentioned something about a “dual voltage hair dryer.” If I bought one here in the states, would I need an adapter or converter for that?
THANKS!!
Adapter: Just lets your plugs - the physical shapes - work with their sockets. Does not do anything to the electricity. Small, cheap, available everywhere, just little bits of plastic and metal and a tiny bit of wiring. You will want to bring one.
Converter: "Converts" THEIR (more powerful) electricity down to use our devices (without making them go "poof" with a spark and a small puff of smoke, potentially starting a fire and other Very Bad Things). Heavy, bulky, somewhat expensive, but heavy heavy heavy and usually completely unnecessary for almost all consumer electronics. It would be hard for me (and most people, I think) to justify lugging a converter around the world.
Most popular small consumer electronics (or their chargers) work fine on European electricity and usually just require an adapter for the plug. The exception to this are 1) anything very old, and 2) anything that "makes heat" - like a toaster or...hair dryers. For a phone or camera charger, you probably only need an adapter plug. If you want to microwave your lunch or bake anything (including your hair), then it gets more complicated.
I don't have enough hair to have any relevant experience with hair dryers, but I've heard that so-called "dual voltage" blow dryers may not be quite as dual-voltage as one would hope. Best to ask others about that. Be careful about plugging in anything that makes heat. Charging your phone? Knock yourself out and party on.
A phone charger, or almost any electronics you bring to Europe will have dual voltage. I don't think anyone needs a voltage converter.
Either your travel adapter will have a USB type C port (or lightning for older iphones) or it will have a USB-A port and you can use a USB-A to USB-C cable, or you can plug your American charging brick into a travel adapter. Look at the power brick for your phone. It will say 100-240V meaning it's dual voltage. That's a non-issue.
A hair dryer is a unique situation simply because a hair dryer pulls a ton of electricity from the wall. Your phone charger pulls 20-50 watts from the wall. A hair dryer can pull over 2000 watts from the wall. For that reason, it's going to require some serious hardware to handle dual voltage. If you're bringing a hair dryer to Europe (necessary? won't your hotel have one?), get a dual voltage model. You will still need a way to plug in a dual voltage hair dryer into the wall so use your US to UK or EU adapter.
The RS tour hotels will have a hair dryer for you. Do not bother bringing one from home.
This is what you will need for your phone:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MZD5T3E?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_3&th=1
Enjoy the tour.
Also, someone on another post here mentioned something about a “dual
voltage hair dryer.” If I bought one here in the states, would I need
an adapter or converter for that?
Unless you buy a dual voltage hairdryer that has a UK plug on it, yes you will need an adapter (but not a converter, as you can switch the voltage to work in the UK). I have a small dual voltage hair dryer with a US plug (similar to this https://a.co/d/7dTujYc) and it works fine at home and overseas (with adapter) and the addition of a "hot sock" I use as a diffuser for my curly hair.
As soon as you get your hotel list for your tour, do a quick search to see if they might not all have hairdryers in the rooms. Many do - but note they're often these giant wall mounted monstrosities that may or may not work for your family's hair situation. If you have high maintenance hair people in your group, best to take something that works for you. On my recent trip to London and Paris in the summer I never used my hair dryer and either used the hotel's or let my hair dry in the heat. YMMV.
I'd be cautious of a "dual voltage" hairdryer that's drawing over 9 amps at 220v. I'm not an electrician, but is technology good enough these days for a dual voltage motor of that size not to be a liability? The hairdryer suddenly letting out the smoke trapped inside with a bang and tripping RCDs sounds like a possibility to me. Maybe they're well protected against that.
