All plugs are 2-pronged

Accomodation, House and Garden
1
Hello,

I just moved into a new apartment but I realized that all of the power sockets in my living room are 2-pronged. All of my electronics (TV/etc) have three prongs.

Are there any solutions so I can use my 3-prong electronics in this room?

Thanks for any help!

2
First make sure that your items have are all okay at 200-240, then Hornbach, larger COOP and Migros, and various other home centers sell adaptors. You can also buy an adaptor and connect with a power strip if you've got one that will fit your electric devices, I ordered two off of amazon.de last year.

3
If your appliance comes with a three pin plug fitted it requires grounding and it would be dangerous to attempt to use it in a two pin socket.

In thirty years here I must say I have never seen two pin wall sockets and I’m not even sure they are legal.

4
I’m pretty sure they don’t sell adapters from two pin to three pin. Wouldn’t that be dangerous as there would be no earth?

I would be very surprised if the OP had no three pin sockets at all in his living room as most of them are here unless it’s a very very old building.

5
I agree. This needs the sockets to be replaced including, if necessary, an earth (ground) wire. The regie/landlord should be asked to do it.

Not recommended temporary solution is to remove third pin from plug.

6
Thanks for the replies.

It is an older building, so that might explain it.

In my bedroom there are two 3-prong sockets, but yes in the room that will be the living room, they are 2-prong.

So basically I will need to ask my landlord to replace them? Is that an expensive job? And if he says no I am just out of luck?

7

I found the following here: https://www.digitec.ch/de/producttyp…ie-erdung-5351

It says, in principle, that each electrical socket must have an earth pin. OK. It is a reader’s comment but does sound plausible.

Are you sure that these sockets are constantly live or maybe only live depending on the state of light switches ?

I also found this from Electrosuisse [German] which mentions dangerous old sockets etc. but not the legal situation:
https://www.electrosuisse.ch/wp-cont…igentuemer.pdf . Some of the anecdotes are a bit dramatic sounding or contrived - a guy with his laptop in the bath tub, for instance - but the message is clear enough.

8

Ok, I should probably look for a more official source for this law. If I can find it, I suppose then I should contact my landlord to mention this law, and then ask for them to put 3-prong outlets in?

Also - I am a member of Mieterverband Zurich, should I contact them about this before I talk to my landlord?

Thanks again for all of the help, I appreciate it!

9
If you’re a member of the mietverband, contact them first. I’d expect them to be aware of the relevant laws, and you might not have to search for the law yourself. They can probably advise you on the best course of action.

10
I agree, maybe also show them a photo?

11
Three pronged are only required in new builds, if they were legal at the time of the build, they are legal.

Tom

12
They do, and no, it is not dangerous.

Ground is a nice to have redundant safety feature, but is in no way necessary for proper operation of an electrical device that is properly designed and used.

Tom

13
Wrong, no electrical appliance requires grounding unless designed by a complete idiot, it is a redundant safety feature in case of extreme failure of the device.

Perfectly legal in an older build. We had two, but I replaced one with a three pin.

RaSi control two years ago had no problem with the two pin outlets.

Tom

14
I actually cut off the middle prong on some plugs, such as computer/phone charger as 3 prongs won't fit to European plugs without an adapter !

15
1. Converting to three prongs is likely to be expensive since it would require additional wiring.

2. Redundant or not, I would hesitate to plug a three-prong device into a two-prong outlet by using an adaptor or cutting the ground prong, especially in the kitchen.

16
There are a host of simple single failures which can lead to electrocution, and when designing a device it is acceptable to protect against them by grounding the case to a ground pin.

It is also acceptable to protect against them by "double insulating" the device, which is the standard set for devices without ground pins - this setup requires 2 simultaneous failures before electrocuting the user or a passerby.

Now, it is completely true that running a device meant to be grounded without the ground connected is likely to work and unlikely to shock you. It is also true that the odds of it breaking in a way that will shock you, start a fire, etc, are way higher than it would be for a double insulated device, or a correctly grounded device.

How much higher? Depends on the device. It is hard to imagine a failure which would make a plastic cased TV dangerous, but it is also hard to know for sure. And on the other side of the map, having looked at the inside of my 4 year old traditional espresso machine, the thought of running it without a working ground scares the daylights out of me (think bronze screw fittings and steam release valves next to fabric insulated 240V wiring... one unlucky leak and zap!).

Electrical appliance safety standards exist for a reason, and if you run with a ground pin disconnected, you are running without their protection.

17

There are cases where an earth connection can do more harm than good. A long time ago I nearly lost a friend because his mother wired up the plug on a new electric lawnmower and didn’t pay attention to the colours of the wires.
In some old electrical installations three pin sockets have their earth connection directly derived from the neutral at the socket. That is, the socket is wired with a two core cable. The risks here are that there is an error in the wiring or a neutral connection breaks somewhere, leading to “earthed” appliances becoming live. In Switzerland, there are 3 main earthing schemes and these distinguish themselves by the point at which the earth is derived from the neutral. [German ] https://www.esti.admin.ch/inhalte/pd…145_0619-2.pdf
Generally, the best protection from fault current is an earth leakage circuit breaker which modern electrical installations should have.

18
The first three-prong sockets in Switzerland were wired by just connecting the earth pin with the neutral. This was acceptable until FI switches were installed in the buidings. So if you really really want one and if your building has none of it, you could easily replace the socket and put a little jumper wire in it, or do it on an adapter to stay 111% legal.

19
Back when, 3 to 2 adapters had a wire that you attached to the plate screw.

Tom

20
I'd tentatively suggest that you came close to losing your friend because his mother incorrectly wired a plug, NOT because it had an earth connection.