France electrics

Paul, me old china, that goes for any install!!
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Very true, just more so in France! :)

Do they have any rules there about who can buy stuff?
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No idea if an electrical wholesaler might have their own particular conditions of sale, but you can buy general accessories in But, Carrefour, and any of the other DIY and supermarket chains, no problem.

im pretty sure france use thier own style of sockets not the german schuko ones
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Correct. They are similar in overall design to Schuko, but instead of side contacts for earth they use a pin in the recessed socket which mates with a female contact on the plug.

Two-pin non-grounding plugs are fully compatible with those used elsewhere in Europe. As PW says, many of the molded plugs found on modern appliances are designed with both French and German earthing contacts so that they can be used in either type of socket.

http://www.panelcomponents.com/pcc/France_Belgium.htm
 
Paul_C said:
Two-pin non-grounding plugs are fully compatible with those used elsewhere in Europe.
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Not entirely true there are two varietys of unearthed plugs used in countries that use the french or german systems

CEE 7/16 also known as the europlug

this plug has two 4mm springy pins often angled slightly inwards it has a low current rating (2.5A iirc though different sources seem to conflict on this) It fits most european sockets (it even fits our sockets quite happilly if you use a screwdriver to open the shutters)

CEE 7/17

This plug fits german and french sockets it has the full 16A current rating and 4.8mm pins like the normal german and french plugs. Its essentially thier equivilent of the moulded plugs with plastic earth pins you see here.
 
To the earlier poster, I can confirm, the French and German sockets are certainly not the same.
German sockets have side-swipe earth and are reversible. These are 'Schucko', and used in Germany and Spain, and Holland
The French (and Belgium) have an earthing PIN coming out of the socket, and will only take a plug with a hole in the right place (either a 2 pin CEE7 europlug, a dedicated French one or a universal CE/16 that has both the hole and the side-swipe earths.)
French plugs are therefore polarised. If the earth pin is uppermost, live is on the left, but reverse wired sockets are apparently not uncommon, and its not considered that important.
Note also there are requirements for steel conduit in places we don't have to have it, and very different rules re bathroom earthing. The French regs are surprisingly expensive, and all test certificates (filled out in French) should be presented to the electricity boards man before he will connect.
Anything other than a standard French installation will probably not be connected without a lot of inspection hassles - worth knowing the local man in advance.

regards, M.
PS
Note also that a thinner pin version of Schucko was used in the former communist block, the Russion idea was they could use their appliences in our sockets if they ever came over, but not the other way - I guess the idea was that the invading army would be so demoralised after a few days of being unable to shave that they would never reach Moscow !! However, a few of these sockets made it to east Germany, and are a real pain, as nothing fits them properly.
 
does any one know in france what they think of people pulling the service fuse and connecting a new CU themselves.

here in the uk it seems its technically disallowed but noone cares in reality.
 
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