An interesting series of articles on fakes, but how unfortunate that the IET fails to recognize fakery at the heart of our own field!

BEAMA has been very active in tackling the problem of fake wiring accessories but there is also a very significant problem in fake power leads which use counterfeit BS 1363 plugs. These are often, but not always, easy to recognize by having a partially insulated earth (absolutely forbidden by the standard).

Counterfeit plugs typically have counterfeit fuses (which may explode) and sometimes there are fuses which are simply cosmetic, ie not connected! There are even plugs which have no fuse at all. The cable used in these leads is also usually counterfeit, and sometimes has conductors which contain less than 10% of the copper required.

Clearly such power leads are dangerous, and there are numerous consumer reviews of cables sold by Amazon which have sparked and smouldered as a result of such poor quality. That company has shown itself very slow to take action when fake leads are reported.

eBay is another common source of fake leads, but they at least do take action when requested by trading standards (They removed well over 200 listings which I reported via the Trading Standards route last year.)

For further information on this problem see www.bs1363.org.uk.

David Peacock FIET

Hi David,

In hindsight, I would have to agree with you. This is an important area that requires further investigation. You're not the only one to have highlighted this in reference to our latest issue.

I will be investigating further.

Regards,

Kris Sangani
Engineering & Technology Magazine