[moonmonkey]

I lived in Hong Kong and the UK, you can buy plugs and wire them on to electrical appliances, the whole process takes about 4 minutes, its very easy .

I have now moved to Australia (land where everything seems to be more complicated than it need to be) and want to cut off the UK plugs and wire in Australian plugs without using adaptors.

Is this possible, Bunnings doesn't seem to sell plugs??

Help!

[Lateralus]

It'll be fine. Australia follows the UK/EU's lead on practically everything, from cars to electrical standards.

[Doofy]

240V powerplug datasheet

Use an adaptor for a while. Everyone I know who's moved to Oz moved back again within six months because the place is a little hard to take - a bit "bogan".

[ghporter]

Are you asking how to do it, or where to find the replacement plugs? Australia uses "Type F" plugs almost exclusively (see [url=http://www.kropla.com/electric2.htm]this really helpful page on the subject), which are NOT the same as the UK's "Type G" plugs. That's the easy part. Where to buy replacements? In the States, I go to home improvement or hardware stores to find this sort of electrical stuff.

[moonmonkey]

I was asking if its possible to buy the hardware, every Australian I have asked said you need to get an electrician to do it.
Right....

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

I was asking if its possible to buy the hardware, every Australian I have asked said you need to get an electrician to do it.
Right....

No idea. However...
You can't legally wire your own house in the UK these days, and Oz is a much more restrictive society, so perhaps you're going to have to get an electrician to do it.

I'm guessing. Speak to Face Ache?

[moonmonkey]

Originally Posted by Doofy 

240V powerplug datasheet

Use an adaptor for a while. Everyone I know who's moved to Oz moved back again within six months because the place is a little hard to take - a bit "bogan".

I kind of get what you mean, its like a parallel universe where they have copied everything from the UK and US and got it slightly wrong (but think its better) - the banks here have phone banking phones..... in the bank.

The cable TV has 56 channels of last years TV shows.

[moonmonkey]

Originally Posted by Doofy 

No idea. However...
You can't legally wire your own house in the UK these days

but you can wire a plug in the UK non?

[Andy8]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

I kind of get what you mean, its like a parallel universe where they have copied everything from the UK and US and got it slightly wrong (but think its better) - the banks here have phone banking phones..... in the bank.

Missing Hong Kong yet?

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

but you can wire a plug in the UK non?

Yep. But like we've been saying, Oz is a different ball game... ...a similar but weirdly different ball game.

[Lateralus]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

I kind of get what you mean, its like a parallel universe where they have copied everything from the UK and US and got it slightly wrong (but think its better) - the banks here have phone banking phones..... in the bank.

The cable TV has 56 channels of last years TV shows.

Ditto on my experiences there. I spent 11 months in Oz and went there initially with the intention of goofing around and then picking a city to plant my flag.

Eh... Nope.

Oz was fun, and I'd love to visit again, but I really don't think I could live there.

[moonmonkey]

Originally Posted by Lateralus 

Ditto on my experiences there. I spent 11 months in Oz and went there initially with the intention of goofing around and then picking a city to plant my flag.

Eh... Nope.

Oz was fun, and I'd love to visit again, but I really don't think I could live there.

Did you manage to get a wifi signal in 11 months?
I ask if they have wifi or "wireless internet" in a bar or coffee shop and they just look blankly at me, one person said there is an internet cafe in town, I felt like I has just stumbled into the 1990's.

Melbourne Airport has "Internet Machines" you can put 2 dollars into to get online.

god save me.

[turtle777]

Man, you're destroying my perception of Australia being a cool country to live in.

-t

[moonmonkey]

Originally Posted by Andy8 

Missing Hong Kong yet?

Yes, I don't normally get attached to places, but I do miss happy valley.

[Andy8]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

Yes, I don't normally get attached to places, but I do miss happy valley.

I too am enjoying Happy Valley now after moving from Soho late last year.

I don't mind visiting Australia, but I would never live there again, so many little things make it so annoying.

[Lateralus]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

Did you manage to get a wifi signal in 11 months?
I ask if they have wifi or "wireless internet" in a bar or coffee shop and they just look blankly at me, one person said there is an internet cafe in town, I felt like I has just stumbled into the 1990's.

Melbourne Airport has "Internet Machines" you can put 2 dollars into to get online.

god save me.

Oh hell no.

McDonalds has WiFi nationwide of course, but it's ridiculously difficult to connect to and incredibly slow once you do, regardless of how many people were in the restaurant at the time. I regularly found myself sitting at a table eating an ice cream cone for 10 minutes as I watched my WiFi indicator to see if my MacBook had finally managed to wiggle its way into an available spot on the network... only to get speeds that were much, much slower than any dial-up ever had in the states.

And even with that in mind McDonalds was my go-to while on the move because every other restaurant, bar or cafe that offered WiFi was on some city-built/managed network that was even worse and only available through certain hours of the day.

So to fill the void, nationwide there are 'internet cafes' in any and every area that will appeal even remotely to tourists and they're more than happy to charge several dollars per hour for access to their networks.

To get past the hell of Australian public WiFi I wound up buying a Telstra mobile broadband stick for my MacBook. And in addition to the $40-per-GB awesomeness-fee, I found out shortly after leaving Sydney on my trip toward Perth that mobile broadband in Australia only covers populations centers. The signal is gone once you're a mere 15 minutes beyond most large cities and if you can somehow manage to get any connection at that distance, you're in roaming. Ditto for coverage/roaming on mobile phones as well.

Made me feel good about never purchasing roadside assistance because I'd never have been able to call for help anyways...

Once in Perth I signed a temporary lease in a share house and the best bang for the buck home broadband plan that I or the landlord could find was $60/mo for around 50GBs.

Don't even get me started on FoxTel...

[brassplayersrock²]

I've heard good things about FoxTel, do you mean that you have had altercations with the above said company?

[Face Ache]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

I kind of get what you mean, its like a parallel universe where they have copied everything from the UK and US and got it slightly wrong (but think its better)

Welcome to Slackland! I see you've already got the hang of it.

Now that I think about it (because I never have before) I've never seen a plug in a shop here.

Anyway, plugs can be found here...

RS Australia | World Leading Distributor of Electronics, Electromechanical and Industrial Components

RS Stock No. 780-116.

I'd provide a direct link, but it didn't work. Typical.

[moonmonkey]

Thanks, I found them today in JB HIFI - it was strangely packed with people buying CD players, something I don't think still happened.

[turtle777]

Again, LOL. CD players, really ? Wow.

-t