DIY dunces?

They're simply adding another possible poor connection - and serve no useful purpose. And as I said the chance of the 'tails' being the correct length for your particular plug is rare.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)
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Following up to Dave Plowman (News)

ahhhh, good idea.

Reply to
M

BBC training. ;-)

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Following up to Dave Plowman (News)

Right, I must say you do pick good stuff up here.

Reply to
M

You leave screws that show!!?

Reply to
dennis

"Seems to" maybe, but soldering with an iron rather than a gas torch isn't hot enough to affect the metallurgy of the copper and, if anything, it would make it softer and more ductile by anealing.

The breakage next to solder problem is just a simple stress riser. The copper bends, the solder doesn't. The most strain is put on the copper strands immediately next to the end of the solder. If you make such a joint and want reliability, it needs individual per-wire strain relief. Cue the usual mil-spec or aerospace rubber sleeves and the virgin pliers.

Soldered ends in a plug cable are a small problem because it can "creep" (it gets permanently thinner under the terminal screw force), especially if heavily loaded and getting warm, and this leads to a loose terminal screw, poor connection, overheating, fire, death doome and disaster.

Tin-based alloys like solder suffer from all manner of creep problems like this (Tin has weird metallurgy) and one partial fix is that the solder in tinning pots should have a higher lead content than the usual 60/40 multicore for electrical work. As we move to lead-free paranoia and use the hideous excess-tin solders (aluminium cable for the 21st century) we're going to see a lot more trouble from this.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

15 all

Chris

Reply to
Chris J Dixon

For me, they serve the very useful purpose of keeping the strands of conductor together while poking it into the hole into the screw down terminal. I can understand why soldering the stranded conductor is a bad idea (non-plastic deformation), but I don't think a crimped brass sleeve (aglet/aiglet?) suffers the same problem, so I don''t see that removal is warranted - especially as equipment is supplied with such things in the attached pre-wired plug. However, I do know there are people of long experience here in uk.d-i-y who have witnessed the effect of solder on the conductors - maybe they have seen brass sleeves have the same effect?

I'm not saying you are definitively wrong, but you have used the weasel word 'possibly', which leaves a scintilla of doubt.

Cheers,

Sid

Reply to
unopened

You've got no option on most electrical fittings. And if you look at the offending pic he's attaching the fitting to a backing plate etc so the screw will very likely show.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

How do you conceal screws in most electrical fittings like sockets, etc? I know some come with plastic plugs that cover them - but only el cheapo shed ones.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

You find that a problem without? ;-)

My experience says any extra connection which serves no purpose is to be avoided.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

actually, the brass is just as bad. You need to have something to support the insulation, like a proper crimp has, to get rid of the stress point.

However, assuming the cable grip functions, its all a non issue. There will be no cable movement inside the plug to speak off.

The 'solder isn't springy' argument holds more water though.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Dave Plowman (News) coughed up some electrons that declared:

Hi Dave,

GET are inexpensive (plastic version) but definitely not "cheap"[1] and have plastic plugs. The only problem is I seem to destroy the plugs removing them, so it's a bit of a waste of time...

[1] I've been very impressed by the build quality.

Cheers

Tim

Reply to
Tim S

Many people could attach a plug to a flex, not so many correctly.

Because of the number of lplugs fitted dangerously, or even wires poked in with match sticks (or conductive materials), a law was passed so that all new appliances had fitted plugs.

That was what was intended, to prevent the numpties fitting plugs in a dangerous manner. I expect the percentage who can fit one correctly is still about the same.

Reply to
<me9

The supposedly 'the same length stripped' leads weren't the optimum length for such plugs. The earth lead was still the one that pulled out first.

Reply to
<me9

I did a quick look back on uk.d-i-y, and wiring plugs has generated some discussion previously.

Previous threads are titled:

"PAT visual checks, or How To Wire a Plug" - Nov 2004 "The correct way to wire a plug " - Aug 2006 (Not entirely serious) "What's the best way of wiring a screw-terminal plug with flex?" - Jul

2007 (kicked off by me).

In the last, Andrew Gabriel opined that bootlace ferrule crimps were the way to go if expense were no object, and Dave Plowman gave typically good down-to-earth advice.

I should eat more fish to improve my memory, obviously.

Cheers,

Sid

Reply to
unopened

!

I expect most people who work with them regularly would not need the template. Judging by the number of ill fitted plug tops one used to come across it seemed a shame that those who struggled as they only fitted one occasionally did not use them. I also suspect those who are willing to leave a plug hanging from just the cores would have bought cheap in the first place and a Hong Special would not have had a template. As somebody else has alluded the problem is not as bad as it was due to appliances coming with flex attached to a plug top and the diminishing no of 5 and 15 amp sockets around.

G.Harman

Reply to
damduck-egg

Most other countries were used to buying equipment with plugs fitted for many years before it became compulsory here - but then they probably didn't have the vast range of different ones we did. Even after the 13 amp ring was introduced, there were at least 4 types of non compatible plugs for that - let alone the older 2, 5 and 15amp in both two and three pins.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Is that before you fit them? you push them out from the back using the screw.

Reply to
dennis

There are a few points about this..

nobody actually looks at the screws it is easy to line them up with an electric driver you really should tighten them to the correct torque and not until they look nice you don't get that tingly feeling when you put the screw through the red/brown wire with a power driver

Reply to
dennis

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