Warning : burned sonoff basic (modified / hacked)

I’m interested in your view on the devices can you specifically explain why you believe them to be death traps? Ideally with pictures showing faults you have with the design of the device. Do you have any professional experience with circuit design or electrical compliance for new devices? If so I believe it would be very interested and insightful to see the view of a professional.

2 Likes

Nah. The only FUD here is coming from your unsubstantiated comments. The POW 2 was recently approved for use in Australia.

I do have 15 years of mains powered PCB design experience. I went over my sonoff’s very carefully before deciding I was ok with using them.

3 Likes

I skimmed the documents and found references to many tests for EMI (electro-magnetic interference; generation and susceptibility) and surge tests (momentary voltage spikes). Can you direct me to the sections that tested for all the items you listed? I’m particularly interested in how they test an overload situation.


I ask because it appears this device has no overload protection. It is rated for a maximum load of 10 Amperes. However, it will happily allow that limit to be exceeded because it has no fuse, or other device, to gracefully disconnect the load when the current draw exceeds 10 A.

A standard North American electrical circuit is limited to 15 A (by a circuit breaker or, in very old homes, by a fuse). The Sonoff Basic is rated to 10 A. That means the household circuit will allow it to run at up to 50% overload before the breaker trips. If you watch this video, you’ll see the device develops uncomfortably high internal temperatures when it’s operated at 50% above its max rating. Even a lowly hair-dryer has a simple thermal-cutoff switch (this device does not).

In a nutshell, if you short a Sonoff Basic, it has no internal fail-safe to prevent its own destruction. It relies on your home’s circuit-breaker to cut power and it won’t do that until the Sonoff Basic is running 50% over its current limit.

In an overload situation, most devices are rated to withstand operation up to at least 15 A with minimal damage before the breaker trips or their own internal fuse disconnects. The Sonoff Basic does not.

3 Likes

You don’t pay attention.

The Sonoff Basic is a death trap.

The Sonoff POW is somehow ok (but not entirely, i. e. how the cable is fixed, in standard install is still a risk). I do use them in my home with some precautions

I suggest to all to stop using the Sonoff BASIC.

The CE shouldn’t be on a specific device rather then on a company lol.

BTW this is how they do certification in China

What’s bad about the Sonoff basic when used correctly?

What are the dangers?

Define “correctly”.
A high risk of electrocution or house burning, is a high risk not a certainty. The chances that one day the use, by you or by other person in your house, of a Sonoff Basic will kill people are high.

You may leave 220 V cable exposed and nothing happens in 50 years, or maybe tomorrow somebody is killed by those wires

Well I’ve tried to use my Basic as correctly as possible, I am using a single Basic, only powering a low power output, around 400W so well under 10A load using 230v.

I’m also using a fuse in the mains plug that is connected to the Basic, but not having a fuse in the Sonoff basic itself it a pretty bad design, I guess it’s sold as multiregion so maybe they would need different fuses depending on mains voltage?

I think I’ll look into upgrading my Basic to a different unit, are the Dual R2 units any better?

I tested Sonoff POW2 16A model with 1000W load air conditioner and it burnt after a week, lucky me it was not so severe cause my house made of wood

It was connected like this:
Wall socket ===> 10A Xiaomi ZigBee Plug ===> 16A Sonoff POW2 ===> Air Conditioner

Here is Xiaomi’s Plug air conditioner measurement when Sonoff supposedly “16A” couldn’t take:

Xiaomi 10A plugs working over a year without any issues not even heating, so it might be not a load problem with Sonoff, maybe faulty design

1 Like

Oh, that’s bad, I though the POW were somehow ok.

On a different topic, why you had 2 smartplug in serial?

2 in serial cause after years with Xiaomi I trust them for quality safety and accuracy, for Sonoff I’ve read that their stuff burn sometimes but it’s so cheap I had to try it, but still didn’t trust them so I measured the measurer :slight_smile:

My guess with Sonoff is bad engineering or bad firmwares both the original and opensource cause there are posts online with almost every model of them with some problems

Question what did u have plug into it was
It something over 10amp

Wago is used to connect directly heater to line in without going through sonoff.
In sonoff output you only have pilotwire and neutral. (brown cable input -> brown cable output)

1 Like

Can you please post a link to confirm your statement

I have around 10 POW and POW R2, you make me worry now. I think I will gradually change them too. Is it easy to flash the Blitzwolf? They are pretty cheap (10 Euro) on Bangood, actually cheaper then a POW since to the POW I have to add a plug and a jack

It is discussed somewhere on this forum.

Edit: here Australia - Electrically Certified Hardware

So if you live in Australia and insure your house, if it burns down because of a POW, the insurance will pay. Good

1 Like

Either provide clear evidence to back up your claims or stop making false claims. Also understand that electrical codes vary wildly throughout the world. (But you should already know that if you are making the claims you are)

4 Likes

I will stop now. You can do as you are pleased, if you wish to fill in your house with Sonoff products do it, and good luck. I guess saving lives is not popular.

1 Like