Assignment For Badge

When we wired plugs in physics at school, the earth pin had a rivet through it to prevent us plugging them in.

And the Cat 5 tester works using a shed-load of diodes in the remote unit. I think it works by pulling each pin high in turn with all the others low. Each pin as a forward-bias diode to all other pins (or just some others). Probably like this:
Although I would remove most of the diodes and do it like this:
 
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Disposing of a Moulded Plug:

Sometimes, if a plug is damaged, or you need to feed the flex through a gap, you may have to cut off a moulded plug and replace it. It is imperative that you make the moulded plug safe once removed so it cannot be reinserted into a socket and re-energised. To do this, with heavy pliers, bend each of the pins so they no longer line up with the apertures on the socket.
You should already have snaffled the fuse, and possibly the carrier, for possible future use anyway. ;)
 
Making the plug (or "Plugtop") safe by removing the fuse will no motigate against plugging into a socket whose L & N are transposed - we all know this happens more than it should!

Nobody has commented on the length of earth flex in plugs, all the pics I`ve seen on ESC website etc are poor in this respect - ie showing the earh flex as a longer loop around the long way of the cavity in a plugtop to help it be the last one on a "pull out" .

That would be a good un for the wiki for any of you artists (unless one of you have covered that and I`ve not seen it!).

PPE and Mollycoddling - methinks Ban has a good point here, Give em all a hammer and tell em to hit their thumb with it - they will remember that for life.

Ok then, don`t go quite so far.

Hows about that age old game we all enjoyed in our younger days?
Catch the (charged up) capacitor - well remembered with great fondness
 
While clearing out the garage, I found an old kettle lead I was given by a customer from years ago when I was self-employed.

I kept it as a teaching aid, but it got lost. What great timing!

It is a C13 IEC lead with a free end terminating in a standard plug top.

It has an ill-fitting cover, a chunk of the cover missing giving direct access to the live pin, outer sheath not gripped & cord grip not tightened up, damage to insulation on conductors exposing bare copper (outside plug), RP, cpc not connected, fuse bridged with stranded copper wire, too much insulation removed from conductors, damage to outer insulation.

That'll be a fun test for them!

I'll get them to terminate their leads, test them, then show them the duff one & tell them to write down what they can find wrong with it.
 
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Thanks again for all your help guys!

I'm just waiting for ebuyer to send a Cat5 lead...

I'm sure as heck not buying one from Maplin at £6 when ebuyer have the same thing for under a £1. Even with postage it's miles less.
 
It arrive an hour ago, thanks. I'll make up my frankenstein tester & I'll be ready for tonight.
 
Those Maplin thingys are they any good? Anybody got one?
I suppose the can be modified for a quick check on any two or more wire connectors.
 
Yes, for a tenner it was great to test the leads the lads did tonight.

Plus I bought a cheap Cat 6 lead from ebuyer (£2.71 inc postage) to chop up and make a test adaptor.

The tester I bought after RF recommended it is here:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/rj45-and-rj...m2115X565951X1b14e7cde325123615a30fe4fb100e83

The adaptor I made to test the boys leads was just a Cat 6 lead cut in half with one half attached to a 13A socket and the other to a C14 IEC plug. For simplicity, I used wires 1, 2 and 3. Then one of the leads was plugged into one unit and the other into the other. Then I just set the unit to Auto and it ran through each conductor in turn.

I had a badly wired lead as an example which was OC on the cpc (wire 3)

and had RP. A lead wired correctly shows #1 LED's on both units simultaneously, followed by #2 LED's and #3 LED's.

So it was great to see the tester show up the badly wired lead as LED's #1 and #2 simultaneously, followed by LED's #2 and #1, followed by an extinguished #3 LED.

The most impressive thing was testing their work without energising!

And they were impressed with the kit too!

Thanks, RF!
 
I suppose the can be modified for a quick check on any two or more wire connectors.
Sure they can. Many of the ones sold for computer cabling use have jacks for 8P8C modular, 6P6C modular and USB, with the jacks using line 1 up to whatever the maximum number of pins is needed. But you can also get units which work the same way and have 1/4-inch or 3½mm jacks for mono and/or stereo audio leads, 3-pin XLR, etc.

But with the ones which only have 8P8C modular, you only need to make up adapter leads to whatever connectors you need.
 
Good,
quite a useful little gadget then!

A few years back it would have been a fun thing to feature in the likes of "Everyday Electronics" and build yourself from discreet components.

Nowadays off the peg and modify is cheap enough.

I had a "Google" about and it seems that prices range from £2.49 on Ebay to £14.40 + postage on TLC for what appears in the pictures to be the same gadget.

Securespark,
I think it was a great idea to teach these lads correct wiring of plugs.
Nowadays folks have no idea and those who have often get it poor (even some so called Electricians - hence my comment on earthwires being last to pull out). How often do we see poor maintenance of plugs and flexes etc? A good lesson well taught and top marks to you for your endevours.
 
The adaptor I made to test the boys leads was just a Cat 6 lead cut in half with one half attached to a 13A socket and the other to a C14 IEC plug.
I seem to recall that the BOFH once made up some similar leads. His had 13A plugs on one end and 8P8C plugs on the other....
 

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