Case Study

Product Analysis: The 13A Plug

The 13A plug: a small system

Plugs are made of many components, so we need to think
about the overall function of the plug as a system. This
helps us to ask the right questions about each of the
components. To understand the design of a 13A plug we can
ask the following questions:
Important design questions
What are the function and requirements of each
component (electrical, mechanical, aesthetic,
ergonomic, etc.)?
What is the function of the plug and how does it work?
What is each part made of and why?
What manufacturing methods were used to make each
part and why?
Are there alternative materials or designs in use, or can you
propose improvements?

Take a real plug to pieces and think about what things the designer might have specified.

Design Specification: 13A plug

The plug should:
enable the user to provide an electrical path from the socket to the appliance
prevent an electrical path being formed between the user and the mains!
provide a rigid set of pins for location in the socket
be sufficiently tough to prevent failure upon dropping
be resistant to the use environment (e.g. temperature, moisture, etc.)
prevent or enable the user to fit the cable to the plug
be aesthetically pleasing and easy to grip
satisfy the requirements of the British Standards
These specifications place constraints on which materials can be used.

Choosing the right materials

The safe and efficient functioning of a plug and cable depends on
the ability of the various parts to conduct electricity. Clearly our
first step in choosing materials must be to consider the need for
electrical conductivity in each part. The parts of the plug can be
divided into those which should be good conductors, those which
should be good insulators and those for which conductivity is not a
major factor.

Choosing the right materials at the right price

One way of selecting the best materials would be to

look up values for the conductivity (or values for the
resistivity - its opposite) in tables for various possible
materials: good conductors would have low values of
resistivity whereas good insulators would have high
values. From a list of suitable materials we could then
choose those which are fairly cheap.
However, this method is time consuming and the
designer may miss materials which they simply forgot
to consider. A much easier method is to plot materials
on a chartof electrical resistivity against cost...

This kind of graph is

called a materials
selection chart. Note
how materials of each
class (e.g. metals) form
clusters marked here by
the shaded regions. The
chart makes it easy to
identify cheap
conductors (bottom left)
and cheap insulators
(top left).
We can now see why:
most of the nonconducting parts in the
plug are made from
polymers - they have
high resistivity
all the plug
components requiring
good conductivity are
metallic - there is no
other choice!

Plug body: selecting the material

From the resistivity-cost chart wood seems to be a
cheaper choice for the plug body than polymers. So
why isn't wood used in practice?
The plug body is a complex 3D shape. It is no good
having the perfect material if we can't actually form it to
the desired shape, so we need to examine the
processing options for various materials.

Polymer

+ : routine
? : difficult
X : unsuitable

Polymer
Shaping

Machining

Joining

Wood

ABS
UF
(thermoplast
(thermoset)
ic)

Pine

Polymer
extrusion

Compression
moulding

Injection
moulding

Blow
moulding

Milling

Grinding

Drilling

Cutting

Fasteners

Solder /
braze

Welding

Adhesives

The table shows that:

Polymers can be
shaped by various
moulding processes.
Wood can only be
machined into the
shape of a plug, which
would not be practical
for mass production.
The processing options
are greater for
thermoplastics than for
thermosets.

Plug body: selecting the material

Also, out of all the polymers available, why are only 2
commonly used?
To hold the pins securely and to protect the conducting
parts, the plug body must be sufficiently strong and stiff.
Plugs are also likely to suffer impacts, so toughness may
also be a factor in material choice. A materials selection
chart showing strength against toughness for various
materials allows us to compare various polymers and we
might be able to see why other polymers are not suitable.

The strength of polymers is relatively low

compared to other materials. However,
good design of the moulding shape is able
to provide sufficient strength to support
the pins. Correct shaping is also
important for providing sufficient rigidity
for the pins as the stiffness of polymers is
relatively low (not shown here).
In practice, ABS and urea formaldehyde
are both used for plugs. The toughness of
ABS is a lot greater than that of urea
formaldehyde (remember these are
logarithmic axes) - this means it can
withstand a greater impact before any
damage is caused.
Other materials: Nylon appears to
combine the strength of ureaformaldehyde with the toughness of ABS,
so why isn't it used for plug bodies?
Looking back at the resistivity-cost chart,
we can see that it is much more
expensive than ABS or urea-formaldeyde,
although this may not be the only reason.

Plug body: two different solutions

So why are 2 different polymers used?
Although both ABS and urea-formaldehyde are used for plugs, they are
in fact used for slightly different applications. In addition, ABS is used for
one piece moulded plugs which prevent access by the user whereas
urea-formaldehyde is used for two piece plugs that can be fitted by
users. From the selection chart and processing information we can see
why: ABS is used for one piece plugs because thermoplastics can be
easily joined after moulding. ABS is also much tougher and as a result is
ideal for pre-fitted plugs which might suffer impact during service (e.g.
vacuum cleaners).
As a thermoset, urea-formaldehyde is stronger (and stiffer) than ABS so
it is ideal for a two piece construction where each half must be
individually stronger. The lower toughness means that ureaformaldehyde plugs should only be used for fixed appliances where the
plug is unlikely to suffer impact (e.g. computers or freezers)

Plug pins: selecting the material

Requirements for a pin
The requirements for a pin will determine the materials
properties we should be interested in. Let's look at a few:
Overheating: the pins must not get too hot, or there will be
the risk of fire. The heating comes from the current which is
drawn by the appliance and the resistance of the conductor
(=I2R losses). We therefore want low electrical resistance in
the pin.
Firm fit: the plug will be inserted/removed many times during
its life. If the material wears too much, the plug will be loose in
the socket. The wear resistance of a material depends on its
strength, so we want high material strength.
Low cost: a plug has to be cheap, so we need to keep the
material and processing costs down. Although the processing
costs will depend to some extent on what material we choose,
we want low material cost.

Resistivity - Cost
The materials with the
lowest values of resistivity
are aluminium, brass,
copper and gold. All these
are commonly used as
conductors in practice,
although clearly gold is a
bit too expensive for use
in a plug! Also, although
aluminium is a good
conductor, it is not
suitable for a removal
plug because it develops
an insulating oxide layer.
So, how to choose
between copper and
brass? The strengthtoughness chart helps to
answer this...

Strength - Toughness
We can see from this chart
that brass has higher
strength and hence better
wear resistance than copper.
So, brass is used for the pins
because it is the best
compromise between the
three competing needs for
low cost, good electrical
resistivity and good wear
resistance.
Brass is an alloy of copper; it
is common for alloys to have
higher strength than the
pure metal. The higher
strengths in the copper
bubble only come from 'cold
working' which would be
expensive, so brass is even
more attractive than it first
appears.

Plug pins: selecting the process

Material compatibility
The first step is to consider
which processes are suitable for
use with brass. Clearly the
metal shaping processes are of
most interest and the main
ones are tabulated opposite. It
would also be possible to use
machining to make the pins, but
even at this stage we can reject
this as being too expensive as
there are plenty of other
options. One of the advantages
of metals is that they can be
processed in many ways.
Unfortunately this does not
help us much in choosing a
suitable process! The next stage
is to think about size and shape.

+ : routine
? : difficult
X : unsuitable

Metal Shaping

Machining

Joining

Brass
Sand casting

Die casting

Lost wax casting

Powder metal
forming

Forging

Sheet forming

Rolling

Metal extrusion

Milling

Grinding

Drilling

Cutting

Fasteners

Solder / braze

Welding

Adhesives

Size and shape

The shape of a component is often key to selecting a suitable
process. With metal parts, it is useful to think of the basic shape,
as further steps such as drilling can be used later to produce
specific "features" such as holes. The basic shape may be:
Folded or drawn sheet, such as a can or microwave casing.
2D - components with the same cross-section all the way through - which
may be short things like plug pins, or long things like window frames.
3D - with a complex geometry such as an engine block.

In addition, factors such as symmetry and concave curves will

affect which processes can be used successfully. We have a
small component which is essentially '2D'. So by referring to
further process information (available elsewhere on this WWW
site) we can see that rolling and sheet forming are not suitable.
This sort of information will also help us to decide whether, as
well as being able to be make the component, we can make it to
a high enough standard.

Finish and quality

The next stage is to think about dimensional tolerances, surface finish,
quality etc. These requirements for the plug pin are not very demanding
- so we can do little to reduce our list of processes further.
This is about as much as we can do to reject processes for simple
technical reasons, all that remains is to think about the processing cost.
Economics
We've already ruled out machining on cost grounds. Can any of the
other processes be ruled out because of cost? We're going to want to
make millions of pins, so we need a process with an appropriate
economic batch size. Taking this into account and using the process data
referred to earlier, we're left with die casting, forging and extrusion.
Normally at this stage, there is little more that can be done at a simple
level to choose between these 3 processes. Here, however, we will make
one choice by thinking about how processing and materials properties
are linked.

Processing and properties

The mechanical properties (e.g. strength) of a component depend
on how it is made as well as what material is used. Die casting will
not give as good a strength as forging or extrusion - especially
because of the sharp corners - so we will reject it here leaving
only extrusion and forging.
Although both forging and extrusion are near-net-shape
processes, they both require further steps to finish the pin (making
holes, threads etc.). These post-processing steps will add to the
cost, but will not be sufficiently large to affect our choice.

Plug pins: process selection - comparing the costs

of forging and extrusion
Notice that the production rate
for extrusion is in metres/hour
and not parts/hour. The
number of pins made per hour
depends on the size of each pin
- let's say this is about 1cm. In 1
hour we can extrude 500
metres which will make 500 *
100 = 50,000 pins. As a result,
we could also say the
production rate for extrusion is
about 50,000 pins/hour.

Cost Data

Forging

Extrusion

One-off cost

50

600

Hourly cost

65/hour

50/hr

Production
rate

1000
parts/hour

500
metres/hour

assume the material cost is about 1 penny.

COSTS

Running costs
Startup costs
(= hourly cost
(=one-off cost
production
batch size)
rate)

Batch size

50 100 parts
= 50p per part

100
Forging:

65/hour 100
parts/hour =
50 100000
6.5p per part
100,000
parts = 0.05p
per part

100
Extrusion:
100,000

50/hour
50000
parts/hour =
0.1p per part

600 100
parts = 6 per
part
600 100000
parts = 0.6p per
part

The total cost for a batch size of 100

Process

Material Running Startup

cost
cost
cost

Forging:

1p

6.5p

Extrusion:

1p

0.1p

50
100 =
50p
600
100 =
600p

Total cost

57.5p

601.1p

Plug pins: the cheapest process

The analysis of the process cost shows that the best
way to manufacture plug pins in large volumes (over
10,000) is to use extrusion. In practice, there are many
other factors which might alter this decision, for
example:
machinery that has already been paid for,
special deals with suppliers,
finding trained operators,
environmental consideration.
All of these factors can make the analysis of the process
costs one of the most difficult problems a designer has
in choosing a cost-effective design

Final remarks
There is at least one more important factor
which affects all manufacturers equally standards. If you look on the back of any
plug in the UK you should see BS1363 or
1363A - this means it conforms to a
particular British Standard. Standards are
important in protecting consumers by
ensuring products meet a minimum safety
level. BS1363 sets levels for plug
performance including strength, toughness
and fire-resistance - all of which may a limit
a designer in their choice of materials and
processes.

http://www-materials.eng.cam.ac.uk/mpsite/plug/default.html