how much can one outlet take

TheFool

TheFool

TheFool

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Was wondering, whats the most amount of power that can be taken from one wall socket? (with a multi-plug adapter)

Just curious as to what would be ok, anyone ever tried to draw too much and blown the fuses?

Only ask because when I come to building my gaming pc there would probably be 2 monitors, 2 sets of speakers, xbox 360, laptop, OC gaming rig, printer and various chargers. And there's only on wall socket in my room so . . .

:confused:
 
Greetings,

This depends on the fuse as the breaker box,
Most rings use 30Amp fuses and it take a lot to blow them,

A ring circuit is considered to be rated at 30amps (7200 watts). A ring may serve up to 100 m sq of floor area and, in theory, may have any number of sockets outlets or fused connection units connected to it. With each socket outlet is normally rated at 13 amps, as a 'rule of thumb', they are limited to under twenty outlets, it is unlikely that the variety of domestic appliances being used at any one time will exceed 30amps. The length of cable used in a ring circuit is limited to 50 metres for circuits protected by an MCB. The sockets are normally mounted flush with the wall although surface mounted boxes are often easier to fit when sockets are added to the circuit. .
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Quote took from Diydata.com
Diydata

So looks to be 7200 watts over the ring,
most houses have 2 rings for power sockets or one for each floor,
The house i am in each room has its own breaker box for power and lights.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BS_1363

Because typical British circuits (especially ring circuits) can deliver more current than many appliance power cords can safely handle, BS 1363 plugs are required to carry a cartridge fuse. The fuse is manufactured to BS 1362 and are normally rated at 3, 5, 10, or 13 amperes. The maximum load that can be placed on a socket is 13 A; triple and larger sockets are fitted with a 13 A fuse of the same type used in the plugs. The plugs and sockets are designed to carry up to 250 volts AC, 50 hertz.
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so 13amps X 230V = 2990W

If your wondering why i havent multiplied by 240V, thats because it hasnt been that for a long time - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mains_electricity_by_country

230 V (formerly 240 V in mainland Britain and 220 V in Northern Ireland)
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So ~2700-3000W per outlet is plenty then, and each ring circuit can handle 7200W, even with 3 PC's, four laptops, 6 monitors/TV's, 3 Xbox's and a lot of other stuff it should be fine.

Thanks for the snappy replies, again, was just curious if anyone here's ever overloaded a socket :)
 
so 13amps X 230V = 2990W

If your wondering why i havent multiplied by 240V, thats because it hasnt been that for a long time
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Not that it really matters, but in theory Europe did standardise at 230V years ago, however reality the allowed voltage margins were so wide that nothing actually changed. I just checked a 3000VA APC UPS at a client site in Nottingham and it’s showing 244.8V (it's often nearer 250V).

Thanks for the snappy replies, again, was just curious if anyone here's ever overloaded a socket
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I've come across sockets showing evidence of overloading (mainly just discoloration of the faceplate). Unless you do something very silly you’re unlikely to overload a socket with the equipment described.

Try to avoid daisy chaining extension leads as far as it’s possible.

If it's just a single socket it shouldn't be too expensive to get it replaced with a double, or even a triple. If you’re competent it’s not a difficult DIY job, but might fall under part P of the building Regs.
 
depends how moden the house is, tho the socket they say is 13A most can output 16A due to the MCB/Fuse (radial) or 32A for ring...

most houses run at 230V (accptible to +10% or -6%) to match european standards

some older house use 15A for radial and 30A for ring tho

so by thery a if you was to use only 1 socket on a ring socket you should get awound 6450W of power at 30A and 216.2V (8096W at 32A fuse/MCB and 253V)
but this would create huge heat on the socket it self and you may be requed to phyicly cool it or swtich to a special socket

if you dont want your house to burn down tho and you want safe electrical conditions its advice u use no more then 2800Ws on a single socket it self (althought the ring/radial circit will support significantly highter outputs befor fuse burn or MCB trip)

socket has posibilitys of frying/melting once over 2800W (or use a 13A switch spur+ socket outlet to prevent any wisk if you was to attemped to draw such a ammount of power from a socket)

please dont even try loading the socket in the 1st place!

Edit : Cocker outlet is 40A so 8648W could be accheaved at 216.2v (lowest voltage house could be) or 10120W max! (at 253V)
 
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My Power Meter says my line is 245v, we must have an older transformer around the corner. I don't know how accurate 245v is though.
2 monitors, 2 sets of speakers, xbox 360, laptop, OC gaming rig, printer and various chargers
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Monitors - 30-60w each depending on size.
Speakers - 20w and that's probably 10x too high an estimate.
Xbox360 - 180w if it's an older, 80w if it's slim.
Laptop - 100w
OC Gaming rig - 500W for a typical high end single gpu system.
Printer - Not much.
Chargers -1-2W each.

So maybe as much as 1000w with everything on and loaded up with Furmark. Leaves you almost 2000w spare. Would be messy off one socket though. Get some individually fused and surge protected trailing sockets.

If you want to add a fan heater, kettle, tumble dryer or basically anything that heats water or air then you may struggle.
 
In my kitchen, if I try and run the tumble dryer, microwave, washing machine and boil the kettle at the same time, the switch on the fuse box trips... so there is certainly a limit somewhere. But that doesn't affect the sockets in the lounge. I doubt that you would ever strike it with electrical equipment such as computers and TVs
 
I find this thread curious as my kettle is rated at 2850 watts, and coming out of the same socket I have the heater for my snake's tank. :eek: Plus I have a computer plugged in at the other end of the room. Different socket but I'd imagine it's the same loop.
 
I work for the local council and over the winter we had a situation were the heating was not working for 3 days due to a problem with the gas main in the street. National Grid lent us about 30 or so 3KW small heaters to warm up the building, Of course as soon as many of them were plugged in. ( 4 were even plugged into 1 extention lead) the MCB would trip out. This actually happened during the three days of Christmas while I was off work and so didnt have to go out and sort it all out thankfully :)

As a rule of thumb anything that has an element (Kettles, Heaters, Irons, Dryers) should be plugged directly into the wall socket and never into an extention. I have seen this happen and overloaded sockets is actually the highest single cause of household fires in the uk. For most people its common sense but then some people are just stupid. I have seen serveral plugs that have actually melted to the socket due to the amount of power that is being drawn through them.
 
Phenomenologica said:
I find this thread curious as my kettle is rated at 2850 watts, and coming out of the same socket I have the heater for my snake's tank. :eek: Plus I have a computer plugged in at the other end of the room. Different socket but I'd imagine it's the same loop.
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Your snakes heater if a heat mat is about 10w or if its a bulb maybe 120w so your around the 3000w limit for the the adaptor in that socket.

As mentioned earlier, all sockets on the same ring main offer a much higher wattage limit so the PC on a nearby socket isn't affected.
 
Tuvoc said:
In my kitchen, if I try and run the tumble dryer, microwave, washing machine and boil the kettle at the same time, the switch on the fuse box trips... so there is certainly a limit somewhere. But that doesn't affect the sockets in the lounge. I doubt that you would ever strike it with electrical equipment such as computers and TVs
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Most buildings have 2 or more ring curits, small buildings often have the kitchin on a differants ring to the rest of the house

Phenomenologica said:
I find this thread curious as my kettle is rated at 2850 watts, and coming out of the same socket I have the heater for my snake's tank. :eek: Plus I have a computer plugged in at the other end of the room. Different socket but I'd imagine it's the same loop.
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this is fine, will cause no problems but kettels use a lot of power

Slade2 said:
I work for the local council and over the winter we had a situation were the heating was not working for 3 days due to a problem with the gas main in the street. National Grid lent us about 30 or so 3KW small heaters to warm up the building, Of course as soon as many of them were plugged in. ( 4 were even plugged into 1 extention lead) the MCB would trip out. This actually happened during the three days of Christmas while I was off work and so didnt have to go out and sort it all out thankfully :)

As a rule of thumb anything that has an element (Kettles, Heaters, Irons, Dryers) should be plugged directly into the wall socket and never into an extention. I have seen this happen and overloaded sockets is actually the highest single cause of household fires in the uk. For most people its common sense but then some people are just stupid. I have seen serveral plugs that have actually melted to the socket due to the amount of power that is being drawn through them.
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this is correct, its also advisable that you connect computers into wall sockets to prevent hardware damage. (thankfull due to safty feachers of PSU this is often advoided but is still patentual)

appologys for my bad grammer

extensions will normal have a guid on the power support of the extension
powering 4 hightpowered objects on a extension socket pack will cause the either the connections or wire to overheat

Edit : extension sockets have safty equiptment that will trip the RCD when is useing more then what the socket is rated for (its quite commen that people will have MCB and RCD tripping isues becouse of the safty features of exension sockets and not realise)

some older extensions have litle safty equiptment and will overload the MCB causing it to trip (if this was a fues then it would blow insted)

Edit 2: heaters and heating objects often have hight watt rating becouse the power of a item is messured by the heat it dispeciates (this is the effects of resistance against current hence why Watt = Amp x Volt)

Edit 3: also house voltages are acceptible at min of 216.2V and max of 253V
 
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Stretched said:
Most buildings have 2 or more ring circuits, small buildings often have the kitchen on a different ring to the rest of the house
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That is clearly the case here, the circuit breaker trips and all power to the kitchen is lost, but the rest of the house in unaffected, including my computers :)
 
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