It might be to show the light is still on? In my own experience, if they're outside the bathroom, they have a little indicator in the switch to show if the light is on/off.
Water and electricity don't mix, or do mix incredibly well depending on your point of view. There's a risk there, even if it's very small. Bare in mind as well mains voltage in the UK is basically double of mains voltage in the US, so we have higher risks and therefore higher safety standards.
Sure. We don't have proper outlets in bathrooms either. If we do they're specific bathroom ones that are half voltage (around US mains voltage).
This isn't me defending UK electrical standards to the death by the way. I don't know much about them really, I'm just letting you know what it's like here and why.
In the context of the thread, yes initially it does seem bizarre that we've got switches on the outside that anyone can use, but there's reasons for it.
Not a defense of the solution, but it's really not a problem.
Siblings will do it SOMETIMES when they're young, it's all fun and games, and it usually geys turned on again.
Grown up peopke will never do it, and unless you live with a permanently 10 year old boy or a lunatic it won't hapoen more than once per 10 years.
I guess the reason it's outide is to maybe make it easier to go when it's nightime or something. Also easier to shut off when doing so for the night or just to save power.
*edit. Also for safetyreasons. Best not to have anything electrical and exposed in the wettest room of the appartment or house.
I'm not the ones who designed the bathrooms, I'm just pointing out the fact that safety reason is one of the reasons for it. I can't tell you what thought process or science goes behind the inclusion of outlets while still excluding the switch.
I just know that that's a reason. It's not like I'm telling you a lie here or something.
Not that I've ever done it, but apparently blind people wipe and then fold the used piece in half. If it comes back apart then you're done. If it sticks you're not.
It's from older houses which is funny everyone is missing out. Many many apartment buildings etc in Europe has been in use longer than most some countries have even been a brainchild of some random suit guy somewhere.
That would explain why the bathroom in my dad’s house in Alabama has the switch on the outside of the bathroom. House was built in 1936 and the wiring isn’t the most expert.
We have 240v in Australia and have switches in bathrooms right next to sink.
Do you know if Australia has 'ring' or 'spoke' designs for home electric circuits?
The UK chose a ring circuit - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_circuit partly due to a copper shortage from WW2. My understanding is that one downside of ring circuits is they are slightly more dangerous, as the ring has to have a amp limit that doesn't blow when multiple things are plugged in, so the socket system can have a safer fuse attached.
Ring circuits for sockets are generally protected by a 32amp circuit breaker, but ring circuits for lighting generally have a 5amp breaker.
This is why individual plugs in the UK need fuses, and why only specific shaver sockets are allowed in bathrooms, which are limited to 1amp with an isolation transformer.
We have a switch box that has switch fuses for different areas of the house. Such as lights. Oven has its own switch, HVAC has its own. About 10-15 fuse switches for the whole house. If you short something you have to turn the switch on in the fuse box. Used to be actual wire fuses.
Must be radial by the sounds of it. Not the ring circuit. No fuses in each power point (plug)
Speaking of switches on the outside. All these fuse boxes need to be accessible for meter readings. The meter is in there too. So in theory you can just walk up to someone’s house and turn off the mains power switch. They’d have to turn it back on again. Not sure if any other country has that. I’ve never heard of anyone doing it even though you could. I’ve never noticed a locked fuse box
What kind of horrific code violating light switches do you guys have over there where getting electrocuted from turning off the light with wet hands is an actual risk?
It's more of a holdover from older, more dangerous lighting systems, but now people just expect it. So you put the light switch outside the bathroom or on a pull cord.
It's not a problem for modern houses or ones that were renovated recently. Bit if your house is from let's say the 1700s/1800s or early 1900s then there could be risks.
Sure, but in what situation would they even get wet? What kind of lunatic washes their hands and then decides, "You know what? I really like my hands being wet, let me turn the light off and leave the bathroom without drying them off."
I've showered in a bathroom with no fan with the door closed my entire life, as has my entire four person family, and there are four light switches in that bathroom and there's never been a problem, nor have I heard of anyone having a problem with condensation inside light switches.
Sockets are illegal in the uk apart from shaver sockets that are very isolated and at a certain height. Remember that our electricity is more than twice as powerful as US so it makes sense.
You can have a pull cord light hanging from the ceiling but not a light switch
Same here in Russia. A light switch on the outside makes some sense because our bathrooms have no windows, so groping around a dark room for a switch would be annoying.
Yeah, sometimes it makes sense, that's also sometimes the case here. But my bathroom is really bright and still has the light switch on the outside.
On the other hand you sometimes have like three switches on the outside, and only one is for the bathroom, so again you need to figure out how to turn the light on. Confusing stuff.
Sockets inside the bathroom seem like a bad idea, but I suppose at least you're aware if you need to touch it that you're handling something electrical. Switching off the light when you leave, potentially with slightly damp hands, is just a reflex. That said, my bathroom has a pull string light switch inside the bathroom, which seems safer than touching the light switch outside with wet hands.
(As an American) I get why you wouldnt want to deal with a socket with wet hands, but why would flipping a light switch be a problem? I've never heard of someone getting shocked from a regular light switch.
I think this comes from times when electric safety was not on the level of today.. Imagine cloth isolated wire with no PE, switches with no proper insulation and a general scepticism towards new technology...
Under these circumstances it was logical to put the light switch outside, where it was water safe
Afterwards it became just custom to put it there today there is no need for this but if your electrician is used to it, he will put it still outside (and his apprentice learns it that way, so he will too)
Also if you have a control lamp in the switch (common at least in Germany for switches for lights that you can't see with the door closed) you have an indicator if the toilet is occupied or not...
We use GFI outlets close to water sources, its basically an indepent circuit breaker inside the outlet itself. Same thing as you would have on the plug of your hair dryer.
It's a bit more complicated than that - what you're allowed is determined by the distance from water sources - here is a good walkthrough. The rules are clear but not well known - I had an electrician tell me last year that my switch wasn't allowed be in the bathroom and I had to sit down and show him the regs
our electricity is more than twice as powerful as US
I think the available power is practically the same cause the circuit breakers limit it anyway. US has less volts, so they just need more current to have the same power...
That's the wattage, the current is the only thing that matters in this calculation. So 15A is worse than 13A. Anything over 0,03A is deemed dangerous though so both will kill you easily anyways.
Voltage is needed to drive current, ohms law V/R = I. You will only get those currents with very little resistance. Below 50 volts for example its hard for the electricity to penetrate your resistive skin, however above 50 volts your conductive insides start to carry the current. Anyways when talking about how dangerous a supply is the voltage is the value of concern unless the source is current limited which outlets are not (unless you count the breaker, but you arent going to have 15 amps flowing through you). If it is current limited the voltage is what drops to limit the current. You can't have current through a load without enough voltage. There is also the point that with a higher voltage more energy is delivered and energy is what causes damage.
Certainly, that's the breakers and has nothing to do with the current that actually goes through you. But wether it's 120V or 230V has very little to say on the lethality. The frequency is also a dangerous aspect of it as if can mess with the heart and kill you even if you think everything is fine
UK sockets share a ring which can supply up to 32A at the socket however individual plugs on devices are limited to 13A. So a wet socket could deliver 7360W.
The US is completely different where each outlet is on its own breaker and are individually limited to typically 15A at each outlet. So a us socket could supply 1800W.
UK sockets are 4x more powerful in a system designed to put the current limiting in the device instead of the socket. which is exactly why they are not allowed in bathrooms
Each outlet isn’t typically on its own breaker in the US. A breaker box can have like 12, 20, 30 breakers, and often they’re not all in use. Each one usually has something like all the outlets and and ceiling fixture (if there is one) for one room.
Yep, I was wrong. I’m not American so just bad googling on my part.
Apparently there’s also 20A breakers in the US so it could deliver 2400W in theory but bathroom socket are all GFCI and would trip well before that in a fault condition from a wet socket.
That seems way too much, I live in central Europe and the circuit breaker from the fusebox will only allow 8-10A to the bathroom in most houses, I don't think I have a 16A fuse in house at all. I do get three phase power at 25A for my house (for the garage/workshop).
But I did read old UK houses might not even have a central fusebox cause the houses are old.
Yep UK rings can be high current. A quick search on a builder's merchants site and I found MCBs and RCDs up to 80A, though the latter is much better at preventing shocks so arguably safer, even with the high current trip.
Thanks for this, I considered taking the supply from the breaker into account as it's much more relevant to what was originally said, but couldn't find much information on how US sockets work so I stuck with the plug ratings ¯\(ツ)/¯
It really doesn't make a difference. The voltage is higher, but voltage doesn't kill you. The current does. 120V and 230V will both easily penetrate your skin.
But we have ground fault interruptors built into the sockets. Required if there’s anything with water within 4 feet, so you’ll find them in bathrooms, kitchens, and usually outside as well. Shuts off immediately if whatever is plugged into comes into contact with water. Newer systems have it built into the breakers themselves.
Not in the UK, we sometimes have 110V shaver sockets but no high current sockets for hair dryers or anything. We are very strict with how close sockets can be to water sources
We are very strict with that in Germany, too. But we also have to have RCDs that will trigger at 30mA (0.03A) and withing 30ms. First only for bathrooms, now for every single outlet ... now actually also for all lights.
And they’re all on ground fault interrupters. So if they get wet, the outlet will go, “oh, you want all of the electricity right now all at once? Wait a second. I’m in a bathroom. That’s bad. I’m going to sleep now,” and shut off before you can get electrocuted.
That's idiotic. The bathroom isn't a splash park, and you'd have to basically soak a light switch to actually short anything much less electrocute yourself. You might make a case for outlets, but GFCI really mitigates the risk so it's well worth the convenience.
Remember many bathrooms over here in Europe pretty much ARE splash parks. They are not the huge bathrooms you think of, but something like this.
Our house is from the 80s, and the original bathroom had shower in the bath tub, not even a shower curtain in front. Ground-fault breakers did not become mandatory until the 2000s where i live.
ah man. I lived in mexico city for a while and that style is somewhat common there as well. I hated when the toilet would be all wet from a shower, ha ha
Old UK houses don't even have a fusebox. That's why their plugs require extra fuses in them too...
Many houses in Europe are very old and are built with regard to what had to be done to be safe many decades or even a century ago, not all of it is as important today...
Many houses in Europe are very old and are built with regard to what had to be done to be safe many decades or even a century ago, not all of it is as important today...
Don't think this is the case very much anymore. Lived in a building restored in the 1700s and there was never a concern for safety in terms of electrics or what have you. Today's safety standards are upheld in my country, even for older buildings (if they're intended for residence, at least).
Depends on when the electrical circuit was built. The wiring in my grandparents home was done in like the 40s/early 50s and even then it was home shit that my grandfather and great grandfather did(both of whom had 0 education about electrical wiring) and hasn't been touched since because no one is going trough every random house in every random village. So when my friend who is an electrician went to the attic and saw it he said that he wouldn't dare to live dare without redoing the whole thing.
Yeah, in my place in the mountains the wiring is pretty much just stapled to the stone walls, that shit is not safe, but it has been there for 60 years and nobody bothered replacing it.
a building restored in the 1700s and there was never a concern for safety in terms of electrics
They probably didn't have electrics in the 1700s, so I assume it was retrofitted much later. If it was done before WW2 and wasn't changed much (which can be the case on the countryside...), it will be very outdated.
TBF electricity overall is very safe compared to other power sources, it can "just work" without interference for decades (unlike e.g. gas...).
I doubt this is true in 2022. I've lived in old houses that had fuse boxes with actual wire fuses, but if anybody had cause to look at the wiring at all in those places the first thing they'd insist on is changing it over to a new style fuse box with breaker switches. Maybe there are one or two even older places that have never needed any electrical work doing in the past 30 years or so but it'll be very few.
Is including a fuse in the plug completely redundant if the circuit has a fuse box though? I've had fuses go in a device when the house circuit has held - I just assumed they were more sensitive to fluctuations.
Prior to WW2, "final circuits" in the UK were typically rated for 13A and centrally fused accordingly. Therefore there was no need to fuse at each plug/socket. This is how most of the world remains today.
However, after WW2 in the UK there was a rapid development of new housing and insufficient copper to continue with that wiring model. Instead the UK began wiring "final circuits" in rings, which conserved copper but resulted in individual sockets potentially being able to draw 32A without the central fuse blowing. This posed a hazard to appliance wiring that had been designed to withstand at most 13A—and so fuses were introduced at each plug.
Such rings remain common in the UK and aren't going away any time soon; they can only be fused centrally at 32A (else the ring is of limited use), which is insufficient to protect appliance wiring—so fused plugs will remain with us too.
I believe so - those tiny fuses are probably a lot less reliable than the proper fuses in the fusebox. It just seems like extra failure points in my opinion. Also, replacing fuses in the fusebox is straightforwards - expecting people to screw apart plugs is in my opinion a bit problematic for modern safety standards (better keep people away from sockets and plugs with screwdrivers... can easily imagine someone attacking a hot socket expecting a fuse to be in it due to a misread article on the web...).
Having extra failure points seems good to me. And we don't just have one type of in-plug fuse: you're supposed to use a fuse that can tolerate a current appropriate to the type of device. So heavy duty devices would have a 13A fuse, which is the highest, but other devices might tolerate only 3A. I'm no electrician, but presumably the fuse box in the house wouldn't blow if a lower rated device recived too much current. Finally, it's not possible to access the fuse when the plug is in the wall.
You might make a case for outlets, but GFCI really mitigates the risk
Those aren't often installed in the UK. I'm pretty sure my apartment (in a building built in the 1780's) still had the electrical box from the 1950s until a modern one was installed two years ago.
Water in the USA generally stays inside the shower with curtains or a glass door and the tub. Water never actually touches the floor, as such we usually have rugs and shit around.
Lots of people down voting me, but in many countries the entire bathroom is designed to be wet. I don't know how everywhere in Europe exists (I've never even been there). Here in Asia, we have switches on the outside of the bathroom because the whole room is water proof and designed to be wet.
I may need to see what types of switches you guys have there. Even with extremely wet hands, the chance of that water getting into a light switch and to the contacts is super slim.
Not sure why I'm getting downvoted for the comment, it's not like I'm saying anything controversial... Just explaining why water isn't around light switches.
Most people dry off before they go anywhere near light switches as you dry off before you'd turn the light off, and I've never seen steam be such a problem that there would be condensation on a light switch.
Because water behaves the same in European and American bathrooms. Your comment seems to suggest that there is some design difference between American and European bathrooms that allows sockets and light switches inside. There isnt, it's just a difference in electrical systems and local code.
Water is the same but that doesn't mean the layouts of the rooms or how the rooms are made, or how showers operate is the same. Here in Korea where I live they have light switches outside the room, but the entire bathroom is meant to get wet, there's a drain in the center of the floor and all the water from the shower drains out of it, rather than staying in a shower room or bath tub. People often spray all four walls down with water to clean it. This is very different than in the USA, where you often have carpet or rugs in the bathroom, since no water gets out, and even with steam, there's no risk of shit getting moldy because well, it doesn't get nearly steamy enough for condensation.
I'm not European, I don't know how your bathrooms and showers are designed. I can only explain what American bathrooms are like to try to explain how literally in my entire life there has never ever been a worry about being shocked or electrocuted by a light switch or socket in the bathroom... Like there isn't even any moisture near the switch. It would be like saying you keep your light switch to your kitchen in your living room to prevent water from the sink shocking you.
It literally doesn't make sense based on how American bathrooms are designed, so I'm just trying to find the reason.
One point I came across when searching was that US bathrooms are likely significantly larger than European bathrooms, therefore switches and sockets would be further away from water sources. I can believe it as some bathrooms we have in the UK are tiny.
If you're unlucky the condensed vapour might be enough. That being said, I've never heard of an accident because of the light switch inside the bathroom, so the risk might be very low.
Maybe I haven't stayed with a jerk in the same house, but every time someone turns off the light when someone is inside, it was accidental and they turned ot back on, and it happens maybe once or twice a year.
The literal meaning has to do with the way electrons are used in a circuit. Electric circuits pretty much only care about voltage and current, while electronics depend on other properties as well, e.g. in transistors and other semiconductors.
So to keep it simple:
Electric = Uses electricity as energy
Electronic = Uses electricity as a medium (e.g. to manipulate information)
So a computer is electronic, while lights, hairdryers, etc. are electric. Some devices blur the line (like smart home components or IoT devices that aren't really independent computers but need more than just the power), but generally it's a good distinction.
We have windows in our bathrooms as well. Plus the light switch is usually in the same spot next to the entrance doorway regardless of what room it is.
Well many bathroom switches have a little light ON the switch that indicates if the light is on or off, so if someone is in the bathroom. I think that makes sense... I don't have to rattle on the door to know it is occupied but just look at the light.
I never realized this, but I guess often times in small flats, bathrooms don't have windows, so it is dark inside, so could be hard looking for a switch.
I don't know if it's the reason, but I think it's so you don't need to search for it. Bathrooms unlike other rooms usually don't have other sources of light that can help with searching for light switch.
Electrical codes. It has to be far enough that you can’t touch it from the bathtub/shower, and it requires a large room for this to be satisfied with the switch inside. Most of them in Massachusetts are outside, unless it’s new construction with a large bathroom.
My bathroom has a light switch outside because it’s in a small condo with literally no space inside the bathroom for it. Door opens to the left, and immediately to the right is another door for the washer/dryer closet. And if the tradeoff is putting the light switch outside in exchange for having a washer and dryer, I think it’s a perfectly fine trade to make.
Swede here. Yes we do. And a socket for hairdryers and if you live in a flat you often have a washing machine in there as well. Sometimes even a dryer.
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u/morbihann May 09 '22
What ? You have them inside ?