On Tuesday, 7 January 2020 15:11:52 UTC, Terry Casey wrote:
In article ,



Thinking back to those days, I can't recall a single 13A plug
anywhere being sold fitted with anything other than a 13A
fuse, irrespective of what they were going to be used for,

which is why 13 amp was the best fuse to use, if you wanted your 'appliance'
back up and working again ASAP.


so
how were the public expected to be educated to use the correct
fuse for the job?

They weren't genarlly speaking but there were charts that were sold with fuse packs. Well I saw one in my fathers tobacco tin that contained spare fuses.
There' weren;t as many products about then either.



It was several years after this event that I first spotted
plugs for sale with red (3A) and brown (13A) stickers and, of
all places (unless I'm mistaken) it was in Woolworths!

I remmeber in about 1977, I was asked to check all the plugs and fuses
in teh school science labs to check connections and that bthe right fuse was installed, I was provided with a list of what fuse to put in which type of product. Then the standards seemed to be 3, 5 or 13 amp, that was it.


Now it;s just a 3amp or 13amp sand no calcualting is required or should be done.

https://www.electricalsafetyfirst.or...ugs-and-fuses/

Manufacturers have now standardised plug fuse ratings to be either 3A or 13A. However, 5 Amp fuses are still used in some older equipment and are available to buy.

I'm not sure that of you put a 1 amp fuse in a stand with a 15W light would fail
a PAT test, or any other valuse other than 3 amp but I do have a number of IEC leads with 5amp fuses that passed their PAT in 2018.

Anytime we replace such a fuse it must be with the same type IIRC and the lead must be PAT tested (with a machine) before being put in use.

As we've cherged somewhere bewteen £1.19 and £1.39 per test I tend to
dump the lead by cutting off the plug and removing the fuse and it's retainer,
and use a new lead. I have about 100-200 spare.
Which also get tested even if they haven't been used.