The best connections

My small collection of Trans-Siberian adaptors and cables

I have spent quite a bit of time trying to find out what sort of power there will be on the train. It would seem that some of the more modern carriages are equipped with a socket in every compartment, whereas others have just one shared socket in the corridor for the purposes of hoovering, plus maybe one in the Provnitsa’s private quarters..hopefully for use with a small payment.

My thinking is firstly to have a back up source of charging my devices (see my post this month on the fantastic Power Gorilla) and secondly, to have some splitting options so I can share power if there is only have one socket in the carriage.

I understand that all the trains use the Chinese two pin type plug (with no earth pin) – this is similar to those used in France too.

So what I have is a bit of a “bodge”, but in the UK its the best I can find.. A two pin plug to UK plug, and then a double socket UK plug adapter that takes a combination of plugs, including back to native two pin. In this way if the plug was being used I could add in my adapter and split the power. I’m guessing not many will have this so my chance of always being able to twin off this supply are good.

The picture above shows my kit left to right, back to front – camera battery charger, iPad (2w) charger plug, two way multi pin plug adaptor, two pin to three pin travel adaptor, Skyross travel plug, iPad lead, Kindle lead, and a special 2w iPad adaptor for Power Gorilla. Worth noting that its best to take an iPad power plug as they have more power than iPod ones, but can charge either as well as the Kindle. The Skyross can handle pretty much anything, and also has two USB ports and charge light indication.

I bought most of these at the airport recently, and no surprise there is not a section in the shop for “Trans-Siberian plug adaptors”!

Some travellers report of the danger of using the shared socket in the corridor as it can be subject to power spikes. I guess what I need now is a surge device too, but its another thing to carry.. I looked for this but the travel ones just a have a fuse as the “surge protector” rather than the high speed semi conductor  – so I am not convinced they are any better than my Swiss made Skyross.

If I were going to take this a step further I would go for a “power strip” with a surge protector – like this one from Morewer. In fact in looking at this again I like it so much I have just bought the last one in stock today – it looks like its designed exactly for someone with lots of gadgets taking great train journeys..!