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2015 Dyson Award Finalist Faves: An Easy Way to Turn All Plugs into Mag-Safe-style Connections

Matthew Burton's "Connect" is a better way to plug in

By Rain Noe - September 17, 2015

in Competition | design.edu | Product Design | Tech

This next Dyson Award finalist is Matthew Burton, who's studying Industrial Design at the University of Houston, where he crossed paths with fellow student Justin Farley.

Farley, who has cerebral palsy, is the founder of UNlimiters, a website that showcases product designs that help the differently-abled live independently. Some of these objects are electric and may need to plugged in or unplugged every day, like an electric wheelchair that needs to charge.

During a study with Farley, Burton learned how the constant need to plug and unplug electronics impacts Farley's daily life:

Justin is constantly cycling through and making use of electronic devices in attempts to ease his daily tasks. It was made immediately clear that dealing with the cords and plugs of electric devices was difficult for him. In fact, I found that Justin came into contact more frequently and had more issues with electronic plugs than kitchen utensils during an average day. This problem spurred on the development of a new outlet system that could ease Justin's daily tasks.

Burton came up with Connect, a cleverly-designed module that plugs directly into a standard outlet, providing three perfectly circular, magnetic, female connections. The user then caps the plugs on their devices with male magnetic projections. With this system in place, all plugs essentially become Mag-Safe-style connections that are easy to plug or unplug, and which obviate the need to rotate the plug to any particular orientation.

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I dig that it transforms two plugs into three! And Burton is forecasting a wide market for the system. "While Connect is specifically designed to increase the functionality and usability of electrical outlets for those with physical limitations," he writes, "I found that it can be of great value across markets and across generations. Whether it is a lack of grip strength, or failing eyesight; a bad back, limited dexterity, or a lack of height; Connect is the answer to easing the process of using household electronics; especially those which are frequently plugged in and out."

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Bill Haley

9 years ago

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It's neat, and I appreciate the benefit, but this is really, really unsafe.

- Now even easier for kids to stick things into your outlets and shock themselves - instead of having to fit into a deep, narrow plug, just has to go into the shallow and wide one here!
- Spills and condensation are also even more problematic than ever before, since they can easily bridge hot and neutral.
- That radial contact that he's got is going to be really unreliable (since tolerances are never perfect), and I could see it easily generating lot of arcing/heat (causing fire/waste) or electrical noise (damaging connected devices). Note that it isn't used in the proof of concept.

MagSafe gets around this by being DC, using front-facing contacts, and by using some fairly smart electronics to only turn on the juice when there's a solid connection. The last of these kind of relies on knowing what it's connected to, so that's a non-trivial problem here.

Also, nitpick: AC doesn't have high/low/ground. It has hot/neutral/ground.

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Alexandra Jau

9 years ago

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Oh, I like the look of these. Smart idea with magnets.

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Paul Evans

9 years ago

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It looks great, and it seems to be a lot more convenient. However it doesn't look very safe. I don't know, what are some of the safety precautions?

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Juan Cano

9 years ago

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I want this now!! This is super clever!!

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