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Old 13th Jul 2011, 9:08 pm   #37
robin0577
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Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: London, UK.
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Indeed, 15A BS546 connectors remain the norm for theatre use in the UK, modern exapmles shown below. The main reasons for their continued use being to distinguish between dimmed sipplies and raw mains supplies, and to enable all the fuses or circuit breakers to be in a central location for easier fault finding and repair.
Note that sleeved pins have never become a requirement for these plugs, although a couple of manufacturers have chosen to add that feature. This often raises some eyebrows when it comes to P.A.T. especially in educational environments.
However, the production volumes of these connectors are now so low compared to BS1363 that the cost is becomming close to prohibitive and some users are switching to the more common (Europe-wide) BS4343 16A "Ceeform" plug, at less than half the price.
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