French Connection

[trista]

Here's one for you techies out there.
My new/unused PVR will soon be brought out to my home in France.
The Foxsat comes with a moulded 3 pin UK plug and I don't really want to change it for the French plug because of warranty issues.
If I use the standard UK/French adapter I am sure that the pins on the plug will be transposed ie live will become neutral and neutral will become live.
This is not normally a problem but will it cause trouble in the Humax box?

[gomezz]

If I use the standard UK/French adapter I am sure that the pins on the plug will be transposed ie live will become neutral and neutral will become live.I have never heard that before. I thought you were going to ask about no longer having an earth pin.

[trista]

I have some knowledgeable friends here who say beware of the UK/French adapters because they transpose the live and negative terminals and this was the basis of my enquiry.
The wall sockets in France do have an earth pin.
In the absence of a definitive answer it would appear that my options are to cut off the UK plug and replace with a French one, or take apart an adapter to see if it can be rewired?

[grahamlthompson]

I have some knowledgeable friends here who say beware of the UK/French adapters because they transpose the live and negative terminals and this was the basis of my enquiry.
The wall sockets in France do have an earth pin.
In the absence of a definitive answer it would appear that my options are to cut off the UK plug and replace with a French one, or take apart an adapter to see if it can be rewired?

Why not buy a UK wander socket (B&Q sell them) and wire it to a French plug, or a cheap short extention lead, cut off the UK plug and replace it with a French Plug correctly wired to correct the polarity.

[MikeSh]

I have some knowledgeable friends here who say beware of the UK/French adapters because they transpose the live and negative terminals and this was the basis of my enquiry.
That's a bit unfair on the adapters. The problem will be that UK sockets are wired with L on the RH pin, and French probably have the L on the left. The adapters probably just pass the connection up/down to the physically different pins without transposing.
I've never heard of this issue before - there are a number of similar European plugs and I've never heard of the polarity being different. That this is not raised as a problem on travel sites suggests it isn't an issue.

I'd be surprised if the polarity affected the Humax anyway. Since the power will go to the internal transformer first, the rest of the machine won't know or care what the mains is doing. As long as the earth is good there should be no problem even if there is a fault. (Neutral wiring is required to be insulated as if live anyway (see below).)

In the absence of a definitive answer it would appear that my options are to cut off the UK plug and replace with a French one, or take apart an adapter to see if it can be rewired?I'd use a meter to check the socket you plan to use first. It is not unknown for wiring to be faulty and have the polarity reversed anyway :) (hence neutral wires must be 250V rated).
Alternatively, make yourself an extension lead (any length you like) with a UK socket and French plug. Swap the wires to your hearts content (though I don't recommend Fr L -> UK Earth ;) )

[gomezz]

As long as the earth is good there should be no problem even if there is a fault. (Neutral wiring is required to be insulated as if live anyway (see below).)Is earth even connected or like Topfield boxes is it double-insulated?

[grahamlthompson]

Is earth even connected or like Topfield boxes is it double-insulated?

I think all stb's are double insulated as are all home entertainment eqpt, never found one that was not. Having said that someone will find one :D.

While it's true that reversing the live and neutral won't affect the foxsat working, it's significant from a safety point of view. The internal safety fuse in the foxsat is going to be connected in the live conductor so reversing the polarity will place the fuse in the neutral conductor. Under these circumstances a fault in the box creating a live to neutral fault which blows the fuse will leave the stb still connected to a live conductor.

Potentially even worse is if the stb happens to have a earth return (through a signal connection) then a live to earth fault may not even blow the fuse at all, as the fault current path could be exlusively live to earth and therefore not through the internal fuse. This will leave the fault protection to whatever is provided on the mains source.

My advice make sure that the polarity is correct.

[trista]

Thanks all for your replies.
I think that the idea of using a UK trailing socket modified to take a French plug sounds good.
I did a quick multimeter test and found that contrary to what I was told, everything routes to where it should.
Until I'm comletely happy I will use the trailing socket!