WTF? It would take me less time to replace an outlet (as a test) than has been spent agonizing over the solution to this problem.
Sheeeeeeeesh!
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11 years ago
prevent electrical plug from wobbling loose?
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11 years ago
He doesn't understand the KISS principle when applied to electrical problems. A two dollar outlet will last a few years longer than a one dollar outlet and a five dollar outlet will last even longer but a thirty dollar outlet will last forever. Be careful, Bobby will bury you beneath a pile of pseudo-intellectual codswallop. He would still be over analyzing the situation while the building burned down around him. ^_^
TDD
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11 years ago
ROFLMAO!
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11 years ago
Unless the hair dressers are violent and epileptic, what other likely problem would there be?
The OP said bending the prongs on the cord helped. That's one clue. Though, one might not be enough for you.
Christ>
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11 years ago
One clue about what?
If I have a defective plug and I bend the prongs it will stay in a good receptacle.
If I have a defective receptacle and I bend the prongs on a good plug it will stay in the defective receptacle.
What have I learned? I've learned that bending the prongs on a plug will help it stay in a receptacle regardless of whether the plug or the receptacle is defective.
What haven't I learned? I haven't learned which one was defective.
Unless other plugs fall out of the same receptacle or unless that plug falls out of other receptacles, no one knows which is at fault. A few simple steps would determine that. Steps that would be easier to do than replacing either part as a guess.
We used to call swapping parts without knowing what was really wrong "shot gun troubleshooting".
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11 years ago
Yep, just was talking about that today at work. Had a problem with a gadget, didn't know how to go about troubleshooting it. One guy suggested swapping this part, that part, and the other part. So I gave 'em the shotgunning spiel.
Of course, with consumer electronics, and most industrial electronics, there is no troubleshooting anymore. Bad solder joint on a $500 board, you just bought a new board.
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11 years ago
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John nailed it. When you have poor plug retention, the first thing you try is a better receptacle. A new spec grade receptacle will hold any NEMA 5-15 or 1-15 plug tightly. Done and done.
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11 years ago
Who cares! Take a new receptacle out of the package and try the plug fit. Problem solved in 5 seconds. Some people can make a mountain out of a mole hill.
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11 years ago
Pray tell, how would a plug be defective? How can you make a "defective" plug fall out of a good socket? Good sockets are grabby. I think, in this case, you're mistaken.
Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus
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If I have a defective plug and I bend the prongs it will stay in a good receptacle.
If I have a defective receptacle and I bend the prongs on a good plug it will stay in the defective receptacle.
What have I learned? I've learned that bending the prongs on a plug will help it stay in a receptacle regardless of whether the plug or the receptacle is defective.
What haven't I learned? I haven't learned which one was defective.
Unless other plugs fall out of the same receptacle or unless that plug falls out of other receptacles, no one knows which is at fault. A few simple steps would determine that. Steps that would be easier to do than replacing either part as a guess.
We used to call swapping parts without knowing what was really wrong "shot gun troubleshooting".
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11 years ago
Derby Dad is named John? I didn't know that.
Christopher A. Young Learn more about Jesus
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John nailed it. When you have poor plug retention, the first thing you try is a better receptacle. A new spec grade receptacle will hold any NEMA 5-15 or 1-15 plug tightly. Done and done.
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11 years ago
Well, one could add some solder to that plug so it's nice and tight. I'm sure that's legal !!! Or wrap aluminum foil. !!!
Been retired for 1 1/2 years, but working I worked on plenty of stuff, luckily I had no dealings with lead free boards. I fixed boards, I designed boards. I was building some boards for implants, with transmitters. These darn little capacitors were about 1.5 mm long. I had to use a microscope, and if I hit it wrong with a point, it would flip somewhere, and try to find that !!
Greg
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11 years ago
K.I.S.S. ^_^
TDD
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11 years ago
Ok, while you are running out to the store to get that spec grade receptacle, I'll try my plug in the receptacle on the other side of the room. Before you've made it to your car, I'll know whether the receptacle or the plug was the cause of the problem.
Did you happen to notice that the problem is happening to a hairdresser in a salon. Do you think they have a drawer full of spec grade receptacles lying around? Do you think that they have even one spec grade receptacle lying around?
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11 years ago
You're kidding, right? You've never seen a worn plug that was loose in a receptacle? Dimples worn down, the split prong type flattened, etc? Never?
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11 years ago
No, the reverse is true. DerbyDad is correct.
I've been measuring various plugs in the house with digital calipers and photographing the results, which I've found surprising. There are several types of "defective" plugs I've come across already. Some have blades that are thinner than others, others have blades that are shorter than others and one even has blades that aren't as wide. Any plug that doesn't meet NEMA specs is likely to cause problems.
Of course, this assumes that an overseas manufacturer might want to undersize a run of 100,000 plugs to save some money in material costs and we KNOW they would never do that because they have the highest integrity and they would never abuse our trust .
Aside from out-of-spec plugs, common sense tells us that different types of plugs have different insertion and removal forces and resist accidental unplugging to different degrees. A polarized two prong plug will stay inserted better than a non-polarized one and a three prong plug will "stick" better than either two prong design. More surface area means greater friction.
-- Bobby G.
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11 years ago
1.5 mm long? That sounds like one of those giant 0603 guys. My lead assembler can solder those with one eye tied behind his back. No microscope needed until he gets down to 0201. (But he ain't old like us.)
Trouble with my gadget is I'm building a $100 board and cramming it in a $100 enclosure with $100 worth of other misc stuff, but then hooking it all up to a sealed $3000 off-the-shelf contraption that's about a cubic inch of magic black box. Now, how long do I stare at my end of the deal before I chisel out the black box and try to blame the guy who made that? And I'm just the dumb ass putting it all together, so I barely know what's going on in there to begin with. Shotgunning sucks, but sometimes it's the only damn way to fix it.
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11 years ago
Exactly. It's not dispositive proof of anything except bending a plug's blades can sometimes help the situation - for a while. I tried that with my charger's plug and it still fell out of the wall. Comparing it to other plugs, I found the blades were almost 1/4" shorter than most other plugs. But it hasn't fallen out since I added the outlet extender with the childproof slot shutters. That's because those shuttered outlets require substantially more force to insert a plug - the plug blade has to force the slot cover aside against the force of a spring. It resists unplugging because of that added friction.
We've learned that it's easy to steer a thread away from initial problem. That problem was what can a hairdresser do about her clippers coming unplugged? The proposed rewire solutions all seem to ignore the fact the electricians are not likely to take work orders from non-managers or owners. The question is how does this person solve her problem within the defined boundaries of the situation? There are plenty of things to try before resorting to the "nuclear" option.
If I were a salon owner and someone convinced me I needed all new outlets and the cord still came out of the socket after new ones were installed, I think I'd be demanding a refund. Especially if that electrician failed to inspect the plug first to see if there was something wrong with it before doing the rewire.
There's the old IBM'er joke about the IBM employees on a car trip. They get a flat. The sales manager says "the car's broken, we need a new one." The software engineer says, "let's restart the car and see if the problem fixes itself." The hardware engineer says "let's swap the front tires with the back ones and see if that fixes it."
-- Bobby G.
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11 years ago
New outlets do not equate to "rewiring."
New outlets do not equate to "nuclear option."
Electricians are likely to do what they're hired to do. How would that be considered "taking orders?"
Outlet extenders with safety shutters, velcro, tape, hooks, rings tied on to the cord, springs for strain relief, are all back-asswards ways to ignore the problem, which, I might remind you, includes *sparks* coming from the outlet.
What the hell happened to our OP, "Bob," anyway? I seem to remember him asking for a long term solution.
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11 years ago
I'd say the first thing you do if you're a cosmetologist and not an electrician is to look at the plug to see if it's poorly made. It's not only outlets that are made on the cheap these days. I've been looking at plugs tonight and some have thinner or shorter or narrow blades than others.
The solution has to fit the facts: the person reporting the problem is not the owner or the manager, so yanking that outlet is going to be somewhat more troublesome than "done and done." You surely wouldn't suggest she grab a screwdriver and pull the questionable outlet herself in a commercial establishment she doesn't own or manage?
She first has to convince the owner that some guy named The Daring Dufas (who bills himself as a Veteran of the International Fart Wars) said the shop needs all new outlets. That's going to be a hard sell, I think. Dufe's judgment was made without ever having set foot in the shop and without asking several pertinent questions as in "does the plug wiggle out of ALL the outlets?" How much tugging does it take for it to become unplugged, etc? What kind of outlets are installed now? Are these clippers the only device that exhibits the problem?
While I agree that using cut rate (especially back stab) outlets is false economy, we were given some pretty specific details that tend to rule out a rewire - at least until we know more. If she can make do with a 2 dollar extension cord or outlet extender with childproof shutters, that's the best solution. If that doesn't work, a longer cord with a better plug, perhaps a grounded one for extra resistance to pulling out would be the next step I'd suggest she takes.
With all that said, if the outlet is truly arcing and not just sparking because the plug is already partially pulled out, then as DD noted, the employee has a duty to report the problem. That could be a valid path to a rewiring job. It should at least get the owner to inspect the outlet more closely for signs of trouble. As her friend noted, she's not likely to ask the boss to rewire the outlet so that puts real limits on her potential solutions.
-- Bobby G.
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11 years ago
Sounds like you're having problem on a quantum level where the atoms in the substrate are migrating across boundaries and shorting things out or it could be a classic case of a malfunctioning framistan. ^_^
TDD