On Sun, 01 Jul 2007 06:03:21 GMT, "James Sweet"
wrote:


"John Larkin" wrote in message
.. .
On Sat, 30 Jun 2007 13:35:18 -0500, Wolfi
wrote:



The lack of appropriate machanical stress handling is my biggest rejection
of
the American type 130V power plug system, in addition to extremely poor
design
of those flat contact receptacles, which wear out very easily, giving poor
contact with all bad things to follow..

Not in my experience. I've owned houses that were first wired in the
early 1900's, and I don't recall ever having a bad wall outlet. Most
of the really old ones have been replaced, not because they failed but
rather because they had to be upgraded to accept a 3-prong plug.



Boy I sure have, things got really cheap in the late 70s, about half the
outlets in my 1979 house were bad, of course they also were the cheap
bargain bin home center junk. You can get a pretty good outlet that will
last a long time for about 2 bucks, or you can get a really crappy one that
will wear out for about 75 cents. Guess which goes into most cookie cutter
houses they're building these days?


I've been in this house for about 14 years with zero electrical
problems. The British stuff is no doubt more reliable, but both are
plenty good enough; the US stuff works and is a tiny overall hazard to
life compared to other things.

John