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Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
Hello all,

I'm posting this one in the Hobbies forum since it's completely avocational.

The church ladies have abused the cord on one of their coffee percolators to the point its neutral conductor has developed an open, right next to the molded rubber female end of the detachable cord. Said female end has three openings in the following configuration

I
I I

and due to its molded nature I believe it to be unrepairable...perhaps someone knows of a source for replacement cord ends of this type...?

Failing that:

The defective flat-cross-section cord bears the following marking: UL E251603 HPN 105°C 18AWGX3C VW-1 RIFENG
°
I'm trying to figure out if I can replace it with a spare round-cross-section cord I have whose legend reads: E176096 [UL] SVT VW-1 105°C 300V 18AWGX3C OR C[UL] SVT FT2 105°C 18AWGX3C VW-1 UNIRISE

I'm concerned with the heat dissipating ability of the replacement round cross-sectional cord and that it may be poorer than the flat version.

Unfortunately I'm having no luck trying to find the specs behind the numbers...then again, maybe I just don't know which search terms to use to achieve the "open sesame" I'm looking for...

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

CEC 2015 Table 11 HPN Heater cord, Damp or Dry locations, not for hard usage.
CEC 2015 Table 11 SVT Flexible cord, Damp or Dry locations, not for hard usage.
CEC 2015 Table 12 Both cords are rated for 10 Amps at AWG 18. If you actually have AWG 17, it is rated for 13 Amps. If that is the case then you may have to upgrade to AWG 16.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

How about a replacement cord from the percolator company.

It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts. (Sherlock Holmes - A Scandal in Bohemia.)

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
Hi Bill, thanks for the info from the CEC tables; I used to have a Code book, but that was many years ago..

Artisi: a replacement cord was definitely in my mind as a possibility, but it being a long weekend here in Canada not very many specialized businesses, like appliance repair places, will be open again until Monday.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Why would you not just replace the plug??



If it failed at the plug then the same old style replacement cord will fail at the plug too.

Use a replacement plug with a long strain relief to improve the situation.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Wrong end, thus probably not a standard NEMA configuration.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Quote:

female end of the detachable cord

Ah, I missed that, thanks David.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

They're fairly common over here Keith. If that style is what you're looking for I can shove one in the post to you. 6A or 10A, and how long?

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Not I Scotty! Thanks for the offer. I have about 20 of those power cords hanging in a rack.

BTW last night I needed one for a lamp cord and cut the female end off (both ends in fact) and removed the jacket and then the insulation from the three leads. I then attempted to twist the bare unsoldered strands... It was COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE to do! They could not be twisted. They instantly sprung untwisted to the extent of looking like I'd never even tried. I held them and twisted them about 20 turns and they'd just explode back to the original untwisted state. I was amazed.

I finally got it to work by inter-digitating the 'untwistable' strands with real wire strands and twisting the resulting system. That was really strange, I'm trying to figure out how they even made that wire. I can't believe they would include toxic beryllium in a cheap-ass cord.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

No Be, prob just As. Makes Cu hard as well.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
P.E. Metallurgy, Plymouth Tube

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Arsenic? Really? That sounds rather un-CE y. :) Those strands didn't seem hard really Ed but then those things can be hard to assess in strands that are probably 10 mil.

IR; I didn't know about the required breathing with Be. I know it kibutz'd some machinists.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Some of the finely stranded wire won't twist because not all of the strands are wire, there may be plastic stranding mixed with the wire.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
P.E. Metallurgy, Plymouth Tube

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Watch out for beryllia too. Relatively harmless as a fired solid, the dust is a carcinogen.

It turns up from time to time in very high power electronic devices and RF stuff. We used it a lot in chip & wire hybrids for the military market, but some of the older commercial devices also used it when switch dissipations were much higher than with today's fast devices. Some older heat transfer pastes contain it too - I'm not sure if the present-day recipe includes it or not.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

The wire was probably not annealed after drawing. Copper is hardened by work hardening, not by heat treatment. Fully hard copper makes a pretty good spring. If you heat it momentarily with a torch, it will soften.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

If Cu is pure it will recrystallize and soften from the heat of drawing it. They add small amounts of stuff to slow that process down because it draws better if it stays stronger. Most of it will anneal at the temp required for insulation extrusion. But if you have cheap Cu (needs higher temp) and/or cheap insulation (low melting temp) then it will stay hard.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
P.E. Metallurgy, Plymouth Tube

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

This is clearing up the mystery. Thanks folks!

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
Hey Keith, you wrote:

Quote:

crshears; This is the only replaceable IEC type plug I've seen:
[link Female IEC]http://www.parts-express.com/marinco-320iec15-iec-...[/link]

It does look pretty robust and provides strain relief.

That looks like exactly the required part! Thanks much! I had not yet found such a beast...will see if I can find one locally @ Torbram, or Gerrie, or Guillevin International, or Ideal Supply, or...
Now that I know such are available, I can begin the [bargain!] hunt!

Thanks again.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

That looks like the standard plug for a lot of electronic equipment.
If so, then try Value Village or other similar places. Also try the corner computer repair shop for a good used replacement.
Or, if you have a discarded laptop or other equipment. I have just checked the cords on three laptops and they all have similar ratings to your original cable. One is round, two are flat.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
I was/am uneasy with just using a circular cross-section "flexible" cord in place of a flat "heater" cord - presumably the heater cord has a better thermal emissivity [?] and is less likely to pose a fire hazard, no? Hence the OP; I included the 105°C denotation in both cords...but not all 105°C cords are equal, are they? I don't want to burn the church down...

That being said, checking the bags on the wall at Value Village et al isn't a half-bad idea at all...thanks, Bill.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

What is the rated current of the percolator?

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
I'll check on the weekend...

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
I suppose we could...but then an otherwise perfectly good 30-cup coffee perk gets tossed into the landfill/recycling...not exactly stewardly.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

I understand, it also will not have that "burnt in" taste.

But check out the Amazon link for cables.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
I'm going to disagree, monkeydog; other than for the case where a percolator is actually scorched/burnt from having been allowed to boil dry or something, I consider a perc to be not fully "broken in" until it has been used anywhere from several to as many as a dozen times, since brewing is what surface coats the heating thimble and gets rid of that annoying metallic taste.

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

crshears that is what my intention was when referring to that "burnt in" taste.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
Ah! "Burnt in" = broken in. My misunderstanding.

Speaking of the terminology of burning in...is there any context beyond percs where this is considered a positive thing? We've had to replace computer monitors because the permanent display gets so "burned in" that when the display changes to something else it's challenging to see the new one.

I may be wrong, but I seem to recall that "burning in" was something that was done to thermionically emissive devices, like mercury arc rectifiers, to "break them in..." or is my memory faulty?

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

As I remember, "Burning in" was used to describe a breaking in process for some equipment.
That said,
A pattern "Burning in" to a CRT display was also a common usage of the term even though this use was somewhat at odds with the other common usage.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Well, in the case of a church coffeemaker/peculator if it does not have that subtle burnt coffee taste hence my reference to "burnt in" then it has not been "broken in".
Funny, church coffee always seems to taste the same a all churches. Even visited a synagogue once, and it tasted the same.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

To go back to your question. Same wire gauge and same temperature rating means both cords can carry the same current so neither would carry the current better than the other.

Still, finding the correct replacement is a good idea because the insulation on the heater cord will withstand that use better, and by that I mean the plugging and unplugging and coiling up and such as the unit is moved around.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

(OP)
waross asked:

Quote:

What is the rated current of the percolator?

Answer: 1000 W @ 120VAC - sorry Bill, not only am I one week late, but also it is only now that I notice you asked for rated current, not power...

CR

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." [Proverbs 27:17, NIV]

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Me, I would just take a picture of the old plug, and go to an appliance repair shop, but that kinda takes the fun out of it.

RE: Decoding Electrical Appliance Cord Descriptors

Almost the same experience here. Got back from holiday to be handed one of the church kettles with a "it blew the trip switch".

Perfect opportunity to sit down with my lad and teach him how to do a thorough inspection and use a megger (with tales of the Kray boys to keep him focussed on the H&S bits).

I was expecting low IR (the church ladies do like to dunk the bottom of these things into a bowl of soapy water while trying to fill them through the spout) - but this was a full three-core short where the cable had been repeatedly strained around the cable grip on the wall plug. Perfect opportunity to show off the arcing damage and lack of evidence of any prior long-term overheating before getting him to trim the cable, rewire the plug then test and reinspect the whole thing.

I hadn't realised how little opportunity kids get these days to learn how to wire a plug - I think it was a pretty routine thing for me from about the age of ten, yet my lad has got to nearly 18 without ever having to do it. Moulded-on connectors (or lazy parents) have a lot to answer for.

A.

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