Noisy, Hot Shavers Socket

[Greenish]

Hello. Around a year ago we had a new bathroom placed within the house, and everything was done from new. We had a shavers socket installed and this is something we very rarely use. The job was all signed off properly by the electricians and consequent building inspector.

Having used the socket a couple of times over the summer to charge a toothbrush I noticed it makes a rather loud vibrating sound. This is quite audible and can be heard outside the bathroom. It is not a worrying sound, however, it is a consistent buzz / hum / whirr. I have also noticed the fascia of the socket become quite warm, warmer than I would expect. It's not going to burn anyone, but it does feel like it is working hard when switched on.

Is any of this strange or am I just worrying too much? My ultimate concern is leaving something on when we leave the house to find it starts a fire in our absence - but I presume there are safety systems within the socket that would prevent this happening anyway?

Thanks

[Neil - YVM]

Greenish said:

Hello. Around a year ago we had a new bathroom placed within the house, and everything was done from new. We had a shavers socket installed and this is something we very rarely use. The job was all signed off properly by the electricians and consequent building inspector.

Having used the socket a couple of times over the summer to charge a toothbrush I noticed it makes a rather loud vibrating sound. This is quite audible and can be heard outside the bathroom. It is not a worrying sound, however, it is a consistent buzz / hum / whirr. I have also noticed the fascia of the socket become quite warm, warmer than I would expect. It's not going to burn anyone, but it does feel like it is working hard when switched on.

Is any of this strange or am I just worrying too much? My ultimate concern is leaving something on when we leave the house to find it starts a fire in our absence - but I presume there are safety systems within the socket that would prevent this happening anyway?

Thanks

I suspect the hum is something to do with the transformer inside the shaver socket.

But there should be no noise, and definitely not be getting hot. Sounds like the socket is faulty and should be isolated, and then changed as soon as possible. I would not leave it connected to the mains.

[BFG TERRANO]

Does it say "shavers only" on it? We've changed a few lately that showed signs of heat damage from the 24/7 draw from tooth brush chargers. They aren't designed for this use.

[Greenish]

Yes its a shavers only socket. Weve just not been using it since we found this. What I haven't done is plug a shaver into it so ill go do that now and see how it goes.

[henrycrun]

Are the terminal screws tight?

[CoolHands]

henrycrun said:

Are the terminal screws tight?

^ turn the power off and check the connections. Possibly release and refit each wire, then see if the problem is solved.

[Greenish]

Terminal Screws? Turn Power off? Sorry, all I know is it is a socket on the wall, anything else is totally unknown to me and I have no confidence to do anything in the way of checking it or touching it.

I am now going through the whole chasing my builder to get hold of the electric company who installed it - which is proving very tedious.

[zed4]

My electric toothbrush is the same, it hums loudly when plugged into our ensuite bathroom's shaver socket. I can hear it in the bedroom when we're trying to sleep, so I don't leave it plugged in overnight anymore. I'm going to buy a new socket for ours.

[Jonny_]

Best advice would be to switch off the supply to it at the fusebox/consumer unit, and get it replaced with a new one ASAP. Dicky transformer sounds quite likely from your description, could quite easily cause a fire. Don't take your chances with it.

ETA: buy an adapter for your toothbrush charger, that way you can charge it from a normal socket.

[Andehh]

Hmm our 7 year house has a "shaver use only" socket we use to charge the elec toothbrush up and it is also always warm/humming. Just been to unplug it based in the above, all makes sense about it not bring designed for 24/7 use... I guess?