Dual-nation Power Strip

All frequent travelers know that if you are visiting a foreign country, it's a good idea to know ahead of time what kind of sockets the country you are visiting has, and what kind of adapter you'll need in order to plug-in or charge your electronic devices.

My wife and I have a home in Brazil, where the standard socket configuration is different from the U.S., using round plugs rather than the standard flat prongs on devices manufactured in (or more frequently now, for) the U.S. market.

I've installed dual pronged sockets in our home, which will accommodate both round (Brazilian) and flat (U.S.) pronged appliances and chargers, but have frequently run into a problem when trying to use multiple devices from both countries on the same power strip.

While it's possible to purchase power strips that will accept both plug configurations, these tend be very expensive, (more than US$20), compared to the relatively cheap power strips which can be purchased in the U.S. ($2 to $5 US dollars). So I decided to make my own, and here's how I did it.

If you frequently visit another country which uses a different type of plug then your home country, and you need to plug in devices with two different plug configurations, this Instructable may be helpful.

If you like this Instructable, please consider voting for it in the 'Hack It!' contest.


Materials:
• Powerstrip

Tools:
• Power drill
• Screw driver

If you need to be told to unplug the power strip before you take it apart and start messing with the guts, you should probably stop reading this right now;-)

My power strip was held together by four small screws on the underside, one on each corner. Take these out, and gently pry apart the plastic top bottom, so you can get at the electrical guts.

Once you get the plastic case open, you'll see that there are three metal strips inside; one for the ground, one for the positive and one for the negative. The ground strip is on the bottom, where the longer prong on a three pronged plug would touch. 

For the purpose of this project, we're only concerned about the metal strips on the left and right. Using a screwdriver, gently pry them out from the plastic case, and spread them apart, like wings. (Make sure you don't loosen any of the connected wires in the process).

Now depending on what country you are trying to make a socket for, this will determine where you are going to drill. In the case of a Brazilian plug, the round prongs are just slightly wider than that flat prongs on a U.S. plug. This was very convenient for my purpose, because all I had to do is drill holes at the edges of the existing flat slots. I don't remember what size bit I used, but just match the bit to a plug.

You'll see from the last step that this power strip is being adapted to take three U.S. plugs and three Brazilian plugs.

The last step before reassembling is to make sure that when you plug in the round pronged devices, that the prongs make contact with the metal strip. In order to do this, use a small wire cutter or similar device to cut a small bit of plastic from each side of each soon-to-be modified plug, to allow the inserted plugs to make contact.

(Unfortunately I didn't get a good photo of this process, but see the notes in the photo above).

Once you've cut notches in the plastic, replace the metal strips, and using a flat screwdriver, bend the metal metal slightly, so that it extends into the notches, and will make contact with your plug.

Plug in a device (without plugging in the powerstrip yet) to make sure both prongs make contact).

Now is a good time to test and make sure everything works. If so, reassemble the plastic case, and you're done!

If you followed all the above steps correctly, you should now have a device that you can plug in three round pronged Brazilian devices, and three flat pronged U.S. devices, without a bunch of adapters piled up and hanging off your power strip.