Австралия және Жаңа Зеландия елдеріндегі электр розеткалары мен айырлары

AC power plug and socket used in Australia and New Zealand

AS/NZS 3112 is the harmonised Australian and New Zealand standard for AC power plugs (male) and sockets (female). The standard is used in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and several other Pacific island countries, plus in Argentina and China. The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) "world plugs" Web site calls this plug Type I. The plug consists of two flat pins forming an inverted V shape, plus a vertical earthing pin below them. Double insulated appliances omit the earth pin. When viewing a plug from the rear, and the earth pin downwards, the top left pin is active and the top right pin is neutral. The shank of the active and neutral pins of every 10 amp and 15 amp flat pin plug sold after 3 April 2005 are required to be insulated, in accordance with AS/NZS 3112:2000. (Note that, in a single phase installation in Australia/New Zealand, the "Line" or "Phase" connection is referred to as the "Active" connection.) Since 2000, the nominal voltage in most areas of Australia has been 230 V, except for Western Australia, which remains at 240 V, and Queensland, which transitioned to 230 V in 2020. The voltage in New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga and Papua New Guinea remains at a nominal 240 V, and in the Solomon Islands it is 220 V. The standards of China and Argentina also use the type I plug and socket, though the live (active) and neutral pins are reversed in Argentina, and the plugs and sockets in China are fitted with earth upper most and live on the right. In both countries the voltage is 220 V. Differences in voltage may give rise to compatibility issues, especially for travellers and those purchasing appliances overseas or online. Most 230 V equipment will work with a supply voltage in the range 220–240 V without issues but connecting a 110 V appliance to a 230 V outlet can damage the appliance. Voltage adapters using a transformer may be required to overcome the problem. The mains frequency is 50 Hz in all these countries. Over time, countries in the Pacific Islands that use AS/NZ standards will also transition to the newer voltage of 230 V.

AS/NZS 3112 compliant plugs have two flat pins forming an inverted V shape plus a vertical earthing pin. The flat blades measure with the active (line) and neutral pins long set 30° to the vertical and the vertical earth pin being in length. The pins are arranged at 120° angles around a common midpoint, with the active and neutral centred from the midpoint, and the earth pin centred away. The benefits claimed for their use in these applications include up to 50% faster installation, due to the reduction in the stripping, twisting and screwing down processes.

Australia's standard plug/socket system was originally codified as standard C112 (floated provisionally in 1937, and adopted as a formal standard in 1938). The Australian standard of 1937 was the result of a "gentlemen's agreement", reportedly from 1930, between manufacturers Fred Cook of Ring Grip, Geoffrey Gerard of Gerard Industries and Brian Harper Miller of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria (SECV). The design was based on an American plug and socket outlet first intended for use at 120 V which was patented in 1916 under by Harvey Hubbell. By the early 1930s this design had been up rated to 250 V 10 A capacity and Hubbell had supplied the Australian electrical industry with his sockets. Current Australian plugs fit these American outlets perfectly. (While this socket outlet never became a NEMA standard design, the 50 A NEMA 10 50R, has a similar pin configuration in a larger form.) Argentina, Uruguay and China based their plugs and sockets on the same design. New Zealand also adopted the Australian design, since Australian equipment and many electrical appliances were exported to that country. One of the reasons behind the adoption of that particular design was that it was cheap to make, with the flat pins being able to be easily stamped out of sheet brass, in contrast to round pins or thicker rectangular ones used in other countries. This was also a consideration when the Chinese authorities officially adopted the design in relatively recent times, despite the considerable inroads the British plug had made, because of its use in Hong Kong. The Chinese socket is normally mounted with the earth pin at the top. This is considered to offer some protection should a conductive object fall between the plug and the socket. The Chinese CPCS CCC (Chinese 10 A/250 V) plugs and socket outlets are almost identical, differing by only longer pins and installed "upside down". Though AS 3112 plugs will physically connect, they may not be electrically compatible to the Chinese 220 V standards. Originally there was no convention as to the direction of the earth pin. Often it was facing upwards, as socket outlets in China now do but it could also be downwards or horizontal, in either direction. In Australia, the C112 standard was superseded by AS 3112 in 1990. A major update was released in 2000 as AS/NZS 3112:2000, which mandated active and neutral insulated pins on the plugs sold for use with these socket outlets after 3 April 2005, which somewhat negates any 'advantage' of having the earth pin uppermost. The standard AS/NZS 3112:2004 introduced more stringent testing procedures to test for bending of the pins and subtle changes to the radius of the pin tips. The current version is AS/NZS 3112:2011, Approval and test specification—Plugs and socket outlets.

In 1980, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) rationalised the 220 V and 240 V nominal voltage levels around the world to a consistent 230 V. This rationalisation was ostensibly made to improve the economics of making appliances by allowing manufacturers to produce a range of items with a rated voltage of 230 V. Not all countries have yet converted to the new standard. The nominal voltage in most areas of Australia had been set at 240 V in 1926. In 2000, Standards Australia issued a system Standard AS60038, with 230 V as the nominal voltage with a +10% to –6% variation at the point of supply, i. e., 253 V to 216.2 V. A new power quality standard, AS 61000.3.100, was released in 2011 that details additional requirements. The new standard stipulates a nominal 230 V, and the allowable voltage to the customer's point of supply is, as mentioned, +10% to –6%. However, the preferred operating range is +6% to –2%. (244 V–225 V). In Australia, the actual voltages delivered to customers is set at the state/territory level. As of 2022, all states/territories have transitioned to 230 V standards. Queensland began the transition to 230 V in 2017. The reason given for Queensland's decision to move was the increased use of grid tied rooftop solar installations raising the grid voltage. By lowering the voltage to 230 V, additional headroom of 960 megawatts was created to accommodate future residential power generation from rooftop solar. The voltage in Fiji, Tonga and Papua New Guinea is still 240 V. In China, the Solomon Islands and Argentina the voltage is 220 V.

In Brazil, this kind of plug is commonly found in high power appliances like air conditioners, dishwashers, and household ovens. The reasons why they have been unofficially adopted for this use may be the robustness and high current bearing capabilities, the impossibility of inverting phase (active) and neutral pins, or the fact that Argentina, a border country, uses this plug and used to be more developed than Brazil in the past so there may have been a flux of high powered appliances from Argentina to Brazil at some point in time. Nowadays, Brazil has adopted the national standard NBR 14136, which is loosely based on the IEC 60906 1 standard. NBR 14136 defines two types of socket outlets and plugs: one for 10 A, with a pin diameter, and another for 20 A, with a pin diameter. New apparatus has been sold with the new plug, so the tendency is the usage of the "Australian" plug to fade away.