Cheap USB devise kills woman.

[gordon_s1942]

The report doesnt explain where and how the USB devise was connected resulting the woman being electrocuted but the warning is there to be very careful if using anything connected to the Mains supply.

[ol' boy]

There have been plenty of reports of Electric Shocks with those devices.
Its all over YouTube and other places.
I have 2 or the 4 Port ones with Blue LED... i don't use them anymore, not since they seem to stuff up Smart Phones.

[Uncle Fester]

The switched mode transformer in these things is tiny. The only thing inside them that is separating mains from you touching it is a couple of layers of insulating tape and not even caplan tape. It melts away easy with a soldering iron. There are no separate chambers like there was with the good old 50Hz transformers.

The way these cheap chargers flood the market there is no Fairtrading or any other department that can keep up with this.

Cheap or expensive, every switched mode PSU is a fire hazard.
A voltage surge (indirect lightning) can short a diode and the large electro cap explodes on the AC mains voltage or they explode because they fail as electro caps commonly do.
This happens instantaneously unlike a faulty old fashioned 50Hz transformer that would just get hot and activate the thermal circuit breaker or
the hair thin copper wire on the mains side would melt at a weak spot and break the circuit. No fire.

[mtv]

The report doesnt explain where and how the USB devise was connected resulting the woman being electrocuted......

Speaking to Fairfax, Fair Trading Director Lynelle Collins said: "The voltage seems to travel up through the faulty charger into her phone and she was wearing earplugs and also operating a laptop which was also plugged into a power point.

Seems it was a faulty mains/USB phone charger.

I've seen heaps of these, other battery chargers and mains power supplies with adaptors that don't meet Australian standards. eg: mains pins are easily exposed.

A lot of this dodgy stuff is supplied from China on eBay, etc.

[Softek2]

One report said the person died while listening to music through earphones. We can only presume they have created an electrical path. From my own experience ( as a preschooler ) I found my shock almost indescribable and that was from left hand to feet, the experience will remain with me forever.
I remain in the electronic trade & have had many "boots" since, however that warning set me on a safer path ; I'm sure.

The problem with equipment today is that it is not isolated from the mains in that power supply's directly connected to the mains rather than separated by transformers which cost in both efficency & resources (copper & iron).

Also with this accident one would think earth leakage or core balance units should have reacted quick enough to save a life. We will never know but should respect electricity even at moderate (5VDC) levels.

[ol' boy]

I've had some good belts on the load side of a Safety Switch, it takes a bit to turn one off, more than i was prepared to hang on for

[Philquad]

i was just reading that
the commissioner had never heard of them before
what a load of crap
most of the chargers on ebay dont meet the standards

[Krustyone]

I picked up a charger from the local market some time ago circa iPhone 3G and noticed the phone do really strange things when charging.
i.e. Touch screen non responsive, turning off and on randomly etc.

Turned out the charger was a crappy knock off that was poorly filtered allowing shit loads of AC ripple through.

Straight to the bin with a lesson learnt.

[Downunder35m]

I had one of those cheap charger sitting around as it was included with a cheap tablet from China.
Of course with the wrong plug....
So with nothing else to do I took it apart and was surprised that there was basically nothing in it.
As mentioned above only the bare minimum of parts needed for operating could be found.
The only "good" thing was that underside and the first 2mm of the circuit board were embedded in resin.
Although a quick test on a scraped off piece of this grey resin showed it burns better than a BBQ lighter...
After this "shock" I did the same to mains charger I had left from Germany, was bought for a few bucks from a big electronic supply store, homebrand.
First difference I noticed was that there was a thermal and a 2A electronic SMD fuse at the first stage behind the power plug.
The thermal fuse was on long wires and mounted onto the transformer.
The low voltage stage was seperated by opto couplers and two variacs (?) - those yellow things that go bust once the voltage goes over their rating.
Last comparison was the case...
The German one had all sorts of electrical safety prints as well as one fron the "TÜV" stating it's electrical safety is tested.
The FCC sign also stated the device would neither cause interference nor will it be affected by interference.
On the other side the China version only had a faked FCC sign on it.

For AU conform apadpters you should at least see a AS/NZS sing wth a number behing it.
Also it is good to have a CE and TÜV sign on it as it means they conform to the much tougher european standards, you see this quite often on genuine stuff from HP, ACER, Siemens and on some chargers for mobile phones as well.
No signs apart from a "FCC" usually means you got crap if it is not from a well know brand - international operating companies often do their certifications internally in terms of labeling and can be considered save, Nokia chargers are a good example for them, you might only find patent numbers on them.

A common problem with uncertified apapters is that the can cause massive interference, a good oscilloscope will show you
With only basic filters it is also quite common that you have a high frequency voltage over the supplied DC output, in some case in the range of over 40V, in reare cases up to a few hundret volts, although the current can be neglected they can cause damage to sensitive electronics connected to the adapter.

[TVguy]

Unless a mains powered item has a valid Australian I will not countenance its use or presence in my household.


These generic USB chargers and power adapters are time bombs waiting to harm the unsuspecting end user.
The Chinese makers of these products will happily stamp UL (Underwriters Laboratories) and CE approvals without ever subjecting the device to any testing. Most will not bother to fake the Australian RCM as it would cost them money in ink.

For an insight into how appallingly bad these power supplies can be, witness the legendary Mike Harrison tear down a crappy PSU:



Think of your loved ones and destroy and dispose of any dubious mains powered device that can be tethered to any portable device.

[loanrangiel]

Shocking news , no pun intended...............ok maybe slightly. Young woman with a baby so it is sad.

[tristen]

It appears that the NSW Department of Fair Trading has acted to prevent further sales of the allegedly faulty product.

Businesses raided over sale of faulty USB chargers

Posted Sun 29 Jun 2014, 9:45am AEST | Updated 10 hours 3 minutes ago

The New South Wales Department of Fair Trading has raided businesses and markets in Sydney to crackdown on faulty USB chargers.

Fair Trading Commissioner Rod Stowe revealed on Friday that a woman died in April after she plugged a faulty USB charger into her laptop and was electrocuted at North Gosford, on the state's Central Coast.

An investigation found the charger she was using was an unofficial product and not compliant with Australian standards.

See the full report at .

[Downunder35m]

Sadly it does not matter where you look these days, timebombs are everywhere
Inspired by the above video I used the bad weather to escape to the shopping mall...
First stop was a guy selling these little remote helicopters for cheap.
The batteries are simply put in shrink warp with no protection at all, no heli had a charger that was not made in asia and of course no safety ticks were found.
Second stop was BigW and I used my almost empty phone and USB tester to pretend an interest in a new charger.
After a bit of talk the guy at the counter agreed to let me test some first, was a tough cookie though.
3 cheaper charger made in asia failed to provide more than 400mA and dropped under 4.5V although rated for 2 amps - mind you my genuine charger puts out 1.8A at still 4.9V if it has to...
Next and last was a 39$ wall charger with one dedicate Apple plug rated at 2.1A and an additional port rated at 3A, in the pack a splitter to get 4 charging ports if needed.
I did not even plug my phone in as the USB tester already showed 6.3V with no load.
A bit unhappy I refused further testing as the guy at the counter insisted me to leave as he said I would make other customer nervous.
Next stop Kmart but no result as I was refuse to test anything - I was told to buy it and if unhappy to bring it back unopened!
Last but not least was Dick Smith and after explaining what I want to do I was told only two chargers would be available as the would not open a sealed pack unless I intend to buy the product.
First charger was a homebrand used to check returned devices and it produced 800mA of the rated 1000mA on my phone at 4.9V.
Second one was a china product priced at 19$ something.
With 4 ports and rated at 2.1A I was a bit sceptical as it would mean only 500mA per port if all are used.
Turned out it did not even give 600mA with my phone although voltage remained at 5.2V.
Adding another tablet that was 50% charged resulted in 4.2V and only 200mA on connected phone but the charger was getting really hot.
This was the only shop that at least said they would do further tests and try to remove overrated chargers from the stores (although I only believe it once they are gone).

What is even more of a concern is the huge amount of toys that come with power adapters or chargers.
Although bigger chains pretend to only sell save products a quick look during my tour showed there are massive amounts of toys out there with no electrical safety standards to be found.
Even at the big toy store I found several products made in asia that had no safety certs on the electrical bits - same by the way for 220V appliances in the big supermarkets.
As I needed a big hammer and some screws for cheap I finnished my tour at the Laverton trash market and after getting my stuff I looked around the stands with all the phone and tablet stuff (not that there were many to be found in this weather) - none of them had any charger, wether for car, nor for 220V with genuine electrical safety batches.
In one case a battery charger was labeled as "Made in Germany" - bad mistake
The company name used was in the wrong color, the packing sub standard and although covered in all sorts of electrical safety certs, none were genuine as they all refered to EU use and for that an EU plug must be on it.
Worst case of missing safety was a guy inside of the halls selling big plasma balls.
I played around with a few and got shocked on the last one. No just a little arc but enough to be painful - and for a sparky that means something.
A closer look showed it was the only one with the power cord going directly into the case - no tramsformer for 12V or similar between.
Picked it up and looked on the bottom, it only said "indoor use only" , "240V AC" and had had a CE batch.
Obviously the owner got concerned that I would break his nice big sphere and demanded that I put it down.
Told him I just got shocked by it and that it obviously has no AU approval signs on it.
Only comment was "If you don't like it you don't have to buy it and now mind your own business".

I can only hope that Fair Trading and maybe even Energy Safe will do more checks nation wide and enforce tougher restriction when it comes to importing and selling electrical goods.
Already only approved devices are allowed to be sold but there is no restriction on the import of inferior products or the online selling to AU.
With all necessary electrical safety boxes ticked you simply won't find an adapter or charger for under 10 bucks as the development and certifications cost a lot of money.
As a very bad guess I would say 80% of aftermarket power adaptors and chargers sold in AU won't pass the current safety standards and even if they do most likely the will fail when it comes to perfomance and electrical interference.
Considering how much we depend on those devices in our modern world it is quite scary and gives the source of unsolved house fires a whole new meaning....