Why Earth Pin is thicker than other pins ?

 Your could have come across many electrical appliances at your home, or else where, where you would have found that the Earth pin in the three pin plug is thicker or bigger than the other two pins. Have you ever wondered why is this, if you have wondered about that here is the reason why it is bigger or thicker than the other pins. An Three pin plug is shown in the picture below.

3 Pin Plug

Earth Pin is used for safety purposes, If any leakage current is flowing, The leakage current flows through the earth pin to the ground making it safe for the users to use the appliance or the machine.  As we know that the current will flow only through the least resistance path, hence the resistance of the earth should be very small to serve its purpose. Here by the below equation or relation we can relate area and resistance.

we can come to a conclusion that as the area of the conductor increases the resistance decreases. So as to keep the resistance of the Earth low compare to other pin. We are using thicker earth pin by increase its area.

Stay tuned for more knowledge gaining posts and do comment if you are satisfied with is of you have a better explanation, always open for discussion.