News0 min ago
Plugs = fire risk?
Saw a question that got me thinking - are plugs left on overnight really a fire danger? How does the process work - does the plug fuse blow then the wires catch light? Why would it blow? Is it a risk if the switch is off or does it need to be out of the socket?
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If you live in an old house with obsolete wiring which should have been changed years ago and you have loads of adaptors with many plugs into one socket then you might be asking for trouble just by the fact that you might be overloading the sockets which will get hot eventually and if the adaptor you have used is a 29 pence Chinese special cheapo model then it might be made from inflammable plastics.
A fuse is a safety device. Basically any equipment connected to a load takes a certain amount of current safely under normal usage. If that current increases - perhaps due to a short circuit or a component failure in the piece of equipment then the fuse blows. A fuse blowing in a plug is effectively the same as switching off the socket- it removes the power source. So -no- the wires cannot catch fire when the power supply is removed!! However if a fault occurs in a piece of equipment whereby it overheats it is possible for a fire to occur before the fuse blows. This harks back to years ago when electrical equipment was not as safe as today and it was recommended to unplug overnight- back then most sockets were of the unswitched variety.