Group:
I'm putting a new plug on my wife's hairdryer. The old plug was
unpolarized, and the cord doesn't give any indication of polarity - is there
any way I should know other than testing with a meter which wire is hot and
which neutral?.
Cheers
Den
there
and
Do you have an ohm meter? Take it apart and ohm out the cord. Should be self
evident from there. Personally I would just go buy another one. Then again
maybe ... naw I am not going there.
I agree with ohming out the wires.
Often one of the sides of the cord will have grooves or writing on
it. The neutral is normally identified by something, though I
have had cords with no discernible difference.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Keep the whole world singing. . . .
DanG
If you have a hair dryer old enough to not have a polarized plug, I
would buy a new safer one. The old one is more likely to soon experience
other problems as well.
For a hairdryer, I think this is good advice. New hairdryers come with
GFCI built-in (and you should have GFCI in your bathroom plugs now anyway).
Even if you say your wife knows how to handle herself around the sink
(surely not the bathtub!), you may have children or relatives around at
some point.
You take elecrtical appliances into the bathroom? Sheesh!
In the UK it is completely illegal to have a mains socket in a
bathroom, (save for a small isolated shaver socket.)
sPoNiX
Ahh
Now this strikes a note! I'm a Brit living in California! My wife used to
rant on about not being able to have a hairdryer in the bathroom in
Berkshire ... but here she can!
Den
wrote:
Oh they have (except they're pronounced RCD's ... residual current device)!.
In the UK though, they tend not to be fitted to an appliance (like modern US
hairdryers) but at the breaker board (UK fuse board), or sometimes in place
of a outlet (UK socket).
Mind you UK wiring regs prohibit outlets in bathrooms, and switches must be
pull switches. All you can have is shaver sockets powered by isolation
transformers!
Den
wrote:
The latter are normal here for kitchen and bathroom installations. I
would say that breaker board is found in new construction, outlet in
remodeling, as a rule of thumb. Of course there are thousands of
kitchens and bathrooms with non-GFCI/GFI/RCD outlets installed.
Only recently have hairdryers come with their own in-cord device.
Interesting. The rule here is no outlets or switches within X inches of
a bathtub or shower (to discourage accidental mixing of electricity and
water), but it's allowed to have outlets in the bathroom proper. In
fact, I was just asking a friend whose bathroom is being redone why she
left only the double socket by the sink instead of upping it to four.
Heck, in my parents' bathroom, there's a radio, a space heater, a
water-pik, and a CO detector -- and that's not counting hair dryers and
curlers that are plugged in temporarily.
I wonder if an hair dryer old enough not to have a polarized plug would
be. Of course then there is the question of what condition it is in and the
fact that it does not have the additional safety features of modern hair
dryers.
Most hair dryers are made as throw-a-ways and not really designed to be
durable.
Den:
D > I'm putting a new plug on my wife's hairdryer. The old plug was
D > unpolarized, and the cord doesn't give any indication of polarity - is ther
D > any way I should know other than testing with a meter which wire is hot and
D > which neutral?.
The wire going to the switch is the hot and goes to the narrow blade
of the plug. Probably easier to use an ohm-meter to trace as the cord
invariably has twisted.
Probably won't help as the original plug was not polarized but "wibbed
iz white iz wide" ==> the ribbed conductor is the white lead and is
the wide prong on the plug.
-
¯ barry.martinþATþthesafebbs.zeppole.com ®
* Daffynition: lot - (undark) - "Jeannie with the lot-brown haar"
--
þ RoseReader 2.52á P003186
þ The Safe BBS þ Bettendorf, IA 563-359-1971
Barry
That was the info I was after. I'm new to the US and so hadn't come across
the "wibbed iz white iz wide" ... which I will remember!
I've borrowed a meter, and, with the switch in the off position, I get no
continuity from the ribbed wire to the element, and continuity from the
element to the non-ribbed wire. So I guess the cord was the wrong way round
originally!
Cheers
Den
HomeOwnersHub.com is a website for homeowners and building and maintenance pros. It is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.