Mains plugs

[meow2222]

Funny question.... I'd like to know the quality levels of the various brand s of mains plug. Will be dealing with a lot, not just a few... thought you folk would know more than anyone.

Ashley - excellent Contactum - middling Duraplug - durable, but ever bent Ever ready - excellent Holder Masterplug MK - mostly excellent, but not the old cable cutter cordgrips NAC NTA Nettle - good Legrand - ok Livia - ok Pifco PMS - ok Scolmore Sealey

Come to think of it, are any really not upto scratch nowadays? I know in th e past cordgrips broke, some plugs ran very hot and some were too narrow to give adequate finger guarding, but not seen any that bad in many years. Al so there were the cordcutter mk plugs I never liked.

Any that obviously don't meet BS will be rejected, eg half insulated earth pins etc!

NT

[Mike Tomlinson]

En el artículo , [e-mail] escribió:

I like the slimline lightweight plastic Legrand ones (with 2 fixing screws for the cover) - they're very handy for small portable appliances which seem odd with a gert big heavy 13A plug on the end of the flex.

[Brian Gaff]

Most of the already fitted ones on double insulated two core devices seem to be just adaptors with a fuse for a bog standard moulded on two b pin as one sees in many countries these days. I do like the plugs with traditional cable grips, these fancy designed shaped inlet for gripping cables is not bad on thick cable, but useless on thin stuff. Btrian

[Jeremy Nicoll - news posts]

I put a cable tie around the end of thin cables in that situation.

[meow2222]

In the days of single insulted mains flex I used to loop such things over & round the fibre cordgrip so it worked.

NT

[meow2222]

What other brands are there? Status

NT

[ARW]

Why are you asking?

[Tim Watts]

I would say there wasn't anything wring with the MK cordgrips except they could be hard to get a 13A flex in - I remember it being impossible when I was 12 - had to pass to my dad.

But I do not recall them damaging the cable.

And there was a lot to be said for the mushroom terminals - you could drop a full wrap around them and know it would be gripped well no matter if the flex was 3A or 13A.

In fact I am going to go and buy a load of MKs if they are still like that - have a few cables to shorted for neatness.

[Tim Watts]

I do not recall any issues with Duraplug - now or in the old days. In

1988 my first job as technician at Reading uni was to put about 50 of the bastards on a load of new bench equipment. I got my karma points on that day for doing a decent job at reasonable speed without complaining :)

I lost 1 karma point later on for fiddling with a PSU with the case off in a public space full of students - and by "lost a karma point" I mean I got the mother of all bollockings :-o

Did not occur to me as I'd designed[1] and build said PSU :)

[1] Barely - it was a traditional transformer, bridge and capacitor - nothing onerous.

[meow2222]

I always remember them being bent as the cordgrip was done up. So they worked, but had to push em a bit to get them in. I expect modern ones have harder bases.

theyre so fussy

NT

[meow2222]

A fussy customer. I understand why they're fussy, and given the quantity involved its worth addressing. I need to know what brands are out there and get some assessment of them for quality. Googling got me nowhere on brands.

NT