Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[Cubdriver]

The 221 is much better than anything else I've ever tried. Wire-nuts are utter shit in comparison. I won't be going back. As a matter of fact, when I'm rewiring or redoing electricks, I remove all wire-nuts I can and replace with 221 clamps. At a considerable expense, but the results are definitely worth it.

What I can't fathom, is why otherwise apparently intelligent people will defend wire nuts just because they're what they know. With a wire nut the wire is held in place by the spring tension caused by the compression of annealed copper (this also applies to any screwed connection), in Wago and similar terminals it's held in place by the spring tension of a properly tempered steel. Young's modulus of annealed copper = 110GPa,  Young's modulus of steel = 190-210 GPa. That ought to be Q.E.D. but no doubt the debate will carry on.

With a properly made up wire nutted connection, the conductors are twisted together and the wire nut is just there to provide some additional mechanical reinforcement and to insulate the connection.







I like Wago connectors, but you're going to have a tough time convincing me me that the small points of contact they make are superior long term to a half inch of bare copper that's been twisted tightly together then further compressed and bonded by being screwed into a sharp-edged conical spring.

-Pat

[med6753]

Stumbled across this pix today and thought I'd share it. My bench about 1990-1991.

[BU508A]

Here has somebody tested the 221 Wago clamps:

https://homeefficiencyguide.com/wago-vs-wire-nuts/

Money quote:

"Wago nuts vs. wire nuts – Wago nuts offer specific advantages in electrical wiring for the DIY homeowner. These include:

    Visual Confirmation of Electrical Connections
    Easy wire removal and replacement
    Can be used to connect solid and stranded wires
    Combine wire sizes with confidence"

[med6753]

Oh my, just found this. Same bench. Date on the back of December 1979.

[Vince]

I'll suggest that you can easily make it a text-only document by bracketing your button labels thusly: [xyx KEY] or [xyx KEY]

This would make the "graphics" content of the original document pretty much a moot point, as long as you can easily tolerate that difference from what is familiar.

Right ... and when the usual suspects complain it isn't "authentic" like the original are you going to back me up? 

I don't understand what the drama is about. I looked at your pic and I struggle to see what it is that you couldn't reproduce in seconds with any mid '90s word processor on a 486 CPU with Windows 3.1 ?! 

The buttons are just rectangles, any word processor can draw basic shapes like this, which you can position pixel by pixel exactly where you want it to be.
The button caption is just a "text box" which is a graphical element and as such again, can be positioned accurately where ever you want.

It's only a few minutes job.. longest part is looking at all the fonts to find one that's good enough to your taste...

[Vince]

Oh my, just found this. Same bench. Date on the back of December 1979.

Gee I was 2 years and a month old !

Looked like even back then you were a fan of wooden dark brown furniture 

Looks like you also quickly upped your game... scope on first / most recent picture shows a much fancier scope than the one on the oldest/second pic !

[mnementh]

The 221 is much better than anything else I've ever tried. Wire-nuts are utter shit in comparison. I won't be going back. As a matter of fact, when I'm rewiring or redoing electricks, I remove all wire-nuts I can and replace with 221 clamps. At a considerable expense, but the results are definitely worth it.

What I can't fathom, is why otherwise apparently intelligent people will defend wire nuts just because they're what they know. With a wire nut the wire is held in place by the spring tension caused by the compression of annealed copper (this also applies to any screwed connection), in Wago and similar terminals it's held in place by the spring tension of a properly tempered steel. Young's modulus of annealed copper = 110GPa,  Young's modulus of steel = 190-210 GPa. That ought to be Q.E.D. but no doubt the debate will carry on.

The spring compression in the WAGO clamp is considerably less than that which can be applied by a tapered thread in the case of the wire nut or by a screw. These means of applying pressure therefore can afford to lose some compression force over time, as they much more closely approach the level of compression applied by a properly crimped connection, which actually puts the material in a plastic state.

Add to that the fact that the WAGO only has one side of a round wire which can be considered "active" contact area, while the twisted wires/wirenut have much greater covalent area, and the fact that deformation of the copper results in even more such contact area, and I still believe in twisting/wirenutting as a viable connection for solid-core wire.

The problem here is actually a bit more complex than tapered threads on easily deformed copper tho...

The tapered threads on a wirenut aren't a rigid part; they are in fact a coil of square wire formed into a tapered thread. This is supported by the hard plastic shell to some extent, which also serves as a handle for tightening.

This means that the wire-nut actually does itself deform a bit as it is tightened, and it is is actually a compression spring wrapped around the joint axially. As long as it is tightened sufficiently, the thread-cutting action will ensure sufficient friction to prevent it backing off, and it will continue to act as a spring under some considerably high tension.

Again... these are all factors which rely on the competence of the user to achieve a reliable connection.

Where mixing solid-core and stranded-core wires are concerned... a whole different ball-game; there much care must be taken. Due to the tendency of stranded cable to roll on itself and work loose, I disagree with the older wisdom that a wire-nut on stranded/solid mixed conductors is a good connection. The nature of how a wirenut applies compression means it works best with only two or three conductors already twisted together such that they make a decent mechanical connection before the wirenut is applied.

Cheers,

mnem
*currently measuring the basement for a fresh coat of DOOM*

[Cubdriver]

Oh my, just found this. Same bench. Date on the back of December 1979.

Not sure which Heathkit wigglescope that is, but summer 1979 (just before freshman year of HS) was when I built my IO-4541.  It's still lurking around here, but hasn't been used in a million years.

-Pat

[TERRA Operative]

Well crap, I just bought my third TDS754D for the last week.

One is smashed to the point of parts mule, one is not working (power supply repair required) and one is working, but appears to have the hard disk option (from what I can see peeking in the side vents in the listing pictures). Wishing upon a star that at least one of these has the hard disk option. Where's a demon when you need to sell a soul? 

I plan to fix the not-working one, unlock options and sell it, then pull the hard disk option from any units that have it for installation into my TDS784C, Spit polish, unlock options and sell the other, and use the parts unit for, well, parts.

I'm tossing up whether I should see if I can mod a 500MHz 754D into a 1GHz 784D and keep it, as it is newer with more fun upgrades/software/etc than my 784C, but my 784C is a genuine 784C with the matching stickers... Hmm, keep both if the upgrade is successful? yeah, probably.


As for tonight's work, I got a TDS power supply all working again. Blown small 'control' mosfet went bad, causing two large switching mosfets to turn on at the same time, popping one of them.
I also replaced C13 C17, it is critical for the standby power and as such works hard over the years as it is always in use whenever the unit is connected to mains.
Apparently when it wears out and the ESR rises, it puts stress on some TVS diodes that have to tke spikes and junk that the cap should be filtering. They then die and take out a BU508A transistor that ends up killing your standby power and then your scope goes dark.
The cap is a low-ESR Nichicon (should be 0.39ohms), mine measures 2 ohms, so out with it and in with a new low-ESR cap.

Next for this scope (744A, modded up to 784A) is to make a set of replacement NVRAM chips as the ones in the unit were failing, causing a-little-more-than intermittent boot issues.


So, if you have, or get a TDS500/600/700 scope, go replace C17, along with the four 1000pF Rifa caps in the PSU! 

I would be inclined to re-type it on the computer and print it on some laser printer sticker paper, laminate it with some clear book covering sticker sheet (Or get sticker paper with lamination sticker in the pack) and stick on a completely new set of instructions.

That way you aren't sealing in a ratty old bit of torn paper for evermore.

So to do this I'll have to find a serif font that looks close enough. Shouldn't be too hard. Only thing is there are some primitive graphics used consisting of a rectangle with text either above or below it centered with the sentence. Will have to work on how to do that - maybe insert an externally created graphic. 

The "sticker" that Boonton made is not paper. It's some sort of very thin metallic sheet laminated with plastic on top. The metallic look isn't so obvious though, it's pretty muted, so that I think light gray paper could be used then the protective clear book covering.

There is such a thing as silver laser paper and silver laser sticker paper. However, many reviews say the text doesn't stick to it well, and I don't want a 50 pack of that just for a couple of prints. Also, I think it will look too flashy or "decorative" for this project. I don't feel like wasting $10 for something that won't work for this.

The first step is just to simply type in the text and get a working document. So let's see what I can come up with using light gray paper with a re-creation of the text and graphics. Hey can it be harder that making 3D buttons LOL ... 

Ah yeah, I didn't notice it was metallic. There's some stuff I use for front panels, it comes with matching clear sticky plastic to laminate on top to prevent the print from scratching off, it looks like silver metallic paint and is really nice for front panels, but may be a bit much for your application.

If you can lump it on a scanner (hahahaha) or take a good direct down photo and measure the label size, it should be relatively easy to draw up the graphics to scale. I use Rhinoceros 3D, Illustrator, and Photoshop for my labelling stuffs, but I'm sure they MS Office Suite, or open source software can do the job just fine.

[med6753]

Gee I was 2 years and a month old !

Looked like even back then you were a fan of wooden dark brown furniture 

Looks like you also quickly upped your game... scope on first / most recent picture shows a much fancier scope than the one on the oldest/second pic !

The scope in the older pix is a Heathkit IO-4540 (I think) that I built around 1977 or so. I later sold it and bought the B&K 2120 which I still have and works a treat.

And yes, wood stain is Minwax #230 Early American on Southern Yellow Pine with semi-gloss poly which I still use today.

Edit, and I told you I was older than dirt. 

[mansaxel]

The real test would be to leave them both for ten years and then re-test the conductivity. That's the crucial thing here. Initial performance is oftimes a poor indicator of long term performance, as anyone with an 'ex' will tell you. In both cases the long term performance difference can be safety critical, electrical fire or "the incident with the carving knife".

You will have no disagreement from me. That's what separates things.  I have wire nuts in my walls that have held well for long time; some of them are as crappy as the nuts I see in the US pictures. The Torix by Schneider (who bought swedish premium manufacturer Thorsman, the original developer of the Torix.) is significantly better than the old ones.  None of my Wagos have that legacy, but, as you also wrote, the basic material properties of the spring clamps vs the wire nuts sum up to a very good argument.  Finally, as noted, the 221 series are replies to earlier versions that were clearly inappropriate for Swedish wiring standards.  Not a gen-1 technology.

[mnementh]

I'll suggest that you can easily make it a text-only document by bracketing your button labels thusly: [xyx KEY] or [xyx KEY]

This would make the "graphics" content of the original document pretty much a moot point, as long as you can easily tolerate that difference from what is familiar.

Right ... and when the usual suspects complain it isn't "authentic" like the original are you going to back me up? 

Hell yes.

I think that as a laminated protector over the original label on the unit, it serves to preserve the originality of the TE, not harm it. Of course, how you apply it to the TE will make a big difference as well. 

If you just scab it on there with gaffer-tape, no matter how period-authentic that might be, I'll cringe right along with the rest of 'em. 

mnem
But I'll do it quietly, and look away so they don't see me.

[Zucca]

I like Wago connectors, but you're going to have a tough time convincing me me that the small points of contact they make are superior long term to a half inch of bare copper that's been twisted tightly together then further compressed and bonded by being screwed into a sharp-edged conical spring.
-Pat

Problem is an unsafe main system works... until....  . So they sell homes with horrible stuff hidden in the walls... Everything works 100% and average Joe American can not see the risks... they got/pay the money and bye bye.

If trust Pat or menm when they have their twist nuts.
(They will never use them outside to connect the AC conpressor units, without any IP68 protections enclosure, Wago 221 here will not help others Wago yes)
They will never use them to connect a solid copper wire with stranded wire like for inside lights installations.

I will not believe how much shit the probably average Juan Pablito mexican electrician did in my US home.
Using Wago even average Juan Pablito with the very same brain could do a better job.

Some tools (like Wago) "push" the brains and hands in the right directions.
In other words it is harder to do an unsafe job in you use Wago instead of what you can buy at Home Depot.

[TERRA Operative]

Here in Japan, the connectors are either crimp ferrules wrapped in electric tape and stuffed in a clip-on enclosure, or now what would be equivalent to wagos without the release lever (rotate back and forth while pulling to work the wire out).

Japanese electrical is mostly crap, but it is only 100V, so what can go wrong?

[AVGresponding]

The 221 is much better than anything else I've ever tried. Wire-nuts are utter shit in comparison. I won't be going back. As a matter of fact, when I'm rewiring or redoing electricks, I remove all wire-nuts I can and replace with 221 clamps. At a considerable expense, but the results are definitely worth it.

What I can't fathom, is why otherwise apparently intelligent people will defend wire nuts just because they're what they know. With a wire nut the wire is held in place by the spring tension caused by the compression of annealed copper (this also applies to any screwed connection), in Wago and similar terminals it's held in place by the spring tension of a properly tempered steel. Young's modulus of annealed copper = 110GPa,  Young's modulus of steel = 190-210 GPa. That ought to be Q.E.D. but no doubt the debate will carry on.

The spring compression in the WAGO clamp is considerably less than that which can be applied by a tapered thread in the case of the wire nut or by a screw. These means of applying pressure therefore can afford to lose some compression force over time, as they much more closely approach the level of compression applied by a properly crimped connection, which actually puts the material in a plastic state.

Add to that the fact that the WAGO only has one side of a round wire which can be considered "active" contact area, while the twisted wires/wirenut have much greater covalent area, and the fact that deformation of the copper results in even more such contact area, and I still believe in twisting/wirenutting as a viable connection for solid-core wire.

The problem here is actually a bit more complex than tapered threads on easily deformed copper tho...

The tapered threads on a wirenut aren't a rigid part; they are in fact a coil of square wire formed into a tapered thread. This is supported by the hard plastic shell to some extent, which also serves as a handle for tightening.

This means that the wire-nut actually does itself deform a bit as it is tightened, and it is is actually a compression spring wrapped around the joint axially. As long as it is tightened sufficiently, the thread-cutting action will ensure sufficient friction to prevent it backing off, and it will continue to act as a spring under some considerably high tension.

Again... these are all factors which rely on the competence of the user to achieve a reliable connection.

Where mixing solid-core and stranded-core wires are concerned... a whole different ball-game; there much care must be taken. Due to the tendency of stranded cable to roll on itself and work loose, I disagree with the older wisdom that a wire-nut on stranded/solid mixed conductors is a good connection. The nature of how a wirenut applies compression means it works best with only two or three conductors already twisted together such that they make a decent mechanical connection before the wirenut is applied.

Cheers,

mnem
*currently measuring the basement for a fresh coat of DOOM*

Yes, you can get more pressure with a wire nut or screw terminal than with a Wago. Then it will be over-tightened and damage the conductor. Wagos are designed to apply the correct amount of pressure.

I was sceptical about Wagos when I first saw them. Now I like them a lot, they are superior to wire nuts, screw terminals, and crimps in almost every way, to the point I use them by default now.

EDIT: Oh and btw, it is NOT correct to say the contact is on one side of the conductor only; the spring clamp and the seat are electrically connected.

[Zucca]

Japanese electrical is mostly crap, but it is only 100V, so what can go wrong?

I heard they have 220 and 110/100 at the same time. Two independent power grids to minimize the risk of power out in case of heart quake.
True or legend?

[xrunner]

I don't understand what the drama is about ...

How long have you been with us now? 

I looked at your pic and I struggle to see what it is that you couldn't reproduce in seconds with any mid '90s word processor on a 486 CPU with Windows 3.1 ?! 

The buttons are just rectangles, any word processor can draw basic shapes like this, which you can position pixel by pixel exactly where you want it to be.
The button caption is just a "text box" which is a graphical element and as such again, can be positioned accurately where ever you want.

It's only a few minutes job.. longest part is looking at all the fonts to find one that's good enough to your taste...

That's exactly what I'm doing right now, using Open Office writer to reproduce it. 

[TERRA Operative]

Japanese electrical is mostly crap, but it is only 100V, so what can go wrong?

I heard they have 220 and 110/100 at the same time. Two independent power grids to minimize the risk of power out in case of heart quake.
True or legend?

Just 100V/200V split phase, identical to the USA with 115/230 or 120/240 split phase or whatever voltage it is these days. No redundancy or dual grids or anything.

It's a pain as I'm used to a reasonable amount of power from Australia, 230V/415V 3-phase. Great for workshop tools and welders etc.

[mnementh]

Yes, you can get more pressure with a wire nut or screw terminal than with a Wago. Then it will be over-tightened and damage the conductor. Wagos are designed to apply the correct amount of pressure.

I was sceptical about Wagos when I first saw them. Now I like them a lot, they are superior to wire nuts, screw terminals, and crimps in almost every way, to the point I use them by default now.

EDIT: Oh and btw, it is NOT correct to say the contact is on one side of the conductor only; the spring clamp and the seat are electrically connected.

You say "damage"; I say "deformation necessary to maximize covalent area".

Yes, the spring/seat are electrically connected... similarly, so are the jaws of an alligator clip. And I've seen enough alligator clips with the unsoldered side burned off and spring zorched inside to be leery of that statement as well. 

There's a reason that ground clamps for a welder have a copper strap connecting the two jaws. Yes, I know the Wago has something similar... in principle. Again, leery of the whole thing.

I'll tell you what... When I die, I'll have my wife post the address of my grave in here so when I'm proven wrong in 30 years or so all y'alls can come dance on it. 

mnem
 

[AVGresponding]

Yes, you can get more pressure with a wire nut or screw terminal than with a Wago. Then it will be over-tightened and damage the conductor. Wagos are designed to apply the correct amount of pressure.

I was sceptical about Wagos when I first saw them. Now I like them a lot, they are superior to wire nuts, screw terminals, and crimps in almost every way, to the point I use them by default now.

EDIT: Oh and btw, it is NOT correct to say the contact is on one side of the conductor only; the spring clamp and the seat are electrically connected.

You say "damage" I say "deformation necessary to maximize covalent area". 

Yes, the spring/seat are electrically connected... similarly, so are the jaws of an alligator clip. And I've seen enough alligator clips with the unsoldered side burned off and spring zorched inside to be leery of that statement as well. 

There's a reason the ground clamps for a welder have a copper strap connecting the two jaws. Yes, I know the Wago has something similar... in principle. Again, leery of the whole thing.

I'll tell you what... When I die, I'll have my wife post the address of my grave in here so when I'm proven wrong y'all can come dance on it. 

mnem
 

No. Just no.

Any deformation of the conductor will a) work-harden it, and b) thin and weaken it about at least one axis.

Comparing the clamp of a Wago to a crocodile clip shows your fundamental misunderstanding of how they work. The seat is flat, not a serrated jaw, so it does not give a point contact like a crocodile clip. The contact area is much larger than you imagine.

[mnementh]

By that argument, a crimped terminal damages the conductor; as it extrudes both conductor and terminal slightly if done correctly.

My comparison against an alligator clip have nothing to do with the contact area of the jaws; I'm talking about how the two sides of the clamp are "electrically connected".

Covalent area of the WAGO is still a small fraction of that produced by twisting the wires together.


mnem
 

[Neomys Sapiens]

I seem to have won the relay battle by pounding the dissident voices into oblivion with a 25-page presentation.
So hermetic it will be...
And my NGRU was put to work for verification that they are really polarity insensitive.

The Blue one is polarised. That type has a small permanent magnet to make them more sensitive. It also means the drop out voltage is very low. I've tested 24V examples that held in down to 3V. You have to be careful of sneak paths when the drop out is that low.

This I knew.
1.) it has the proper symbol for that
2.) I know those series.
Regarding the 'Relay battle', I was referring to the 'Centigrid' type (visible in the upper right), respectively a RF optimised variant of them.

[Cerebus]

covalent | kəʊˈveɪl(ə)nt |

adjective Chemistry

relating to or denoting chemical bonds formed by the sharing of electrons between atoms. Often contrasted with ionic.

No other meanings listed.

[Robert763]

I seem to have won the relay battle by pounding the dissident voices into oblivion with a 25-page presentation.
So hermetic it will be...
And my NGRU was put to work for verification that they are really polarity insensitive.

The Blue one is polarised. That type has a small permanent magnet to make them more sensitive. It also means the drop out voltage is very low. I've tested 24V examples that held in down to 3V. You have to be careful of sneak paths when the drop out is that low.

This I knew.
1.) it has the proper symbol for that
2.) I know those series.
Regarding the 'Relay battle', I was referring to the 'Centigrid' type (visible in the upper right), respectively a RF optimised variant of them.

Centigrid are nice, very expensive though. Funnily enough yesterday I found a PCB from a 2" aircraft indicator I designed in about 1995. It has a centigrid on it.
Virtual cookie to anyone who can identify the aircraft type 

[mnementh]

I like Wago connectors, but you're going to have a tough time convincing me me that the small points of contact they make are superior long term to a half inch of bare copper that's been twisted tightly together then further compressed and bonded by being screwed into a sharp-edged conical spring.
-Pat

Problem is an unsafe main system works... until....  . So they sell homes with horrible stuff hidden in the walls... Everything works 100% and average Joe American can not see the risks... they got/pay the money and bye bye.

If trust Pat or menm when they have their twist nuts. (They will never use them outside to connect the AC conpressor units, without any IP68 protections enclosure, Wago 221 here will not help others Wago yes) They will never use them to connect a solid copper wire with stranded wire like for inside lights installations.

I will not believe how much shit the probably average Juan Pablito mexican electrician did in my US home.
Using Wago even average Juan Pablito with the very same brain could do a better job.

Some tools (like Wago) "push" the brains and hands in the right directions.
In other words it is harder to do an unsafe job in you use Wago instead of what you can buy at Home Depot.

I think I said something to that effect back when I posted about not exactly trusting WAGO connectors yet.

Agreed... this home is a case in point. Multiple layers of electrical shitshow one on top of another. But don't blame just Juan. There's probably a Joey, and a Leroy, and a Larry the Cable Guy in the electrical DNA of that place too.  Just like here.



And looking at this nightmare again... part of me says "run a separate ground wire clamped to the gas main, just like that 4 ga bare copper they ran for the AC unit, and have done with it..." 

mnem