Goat Tool Day 15

@eonfifty Genuine Scotchlok, or other reputable brands are great. They compress the wire into a tapering slot to get a solid connection. A good connection will also be gas tight. I’ve personally used some that have been in service for 20 years or so with no problem. I’d prefer to use crimp connectors where possible, but they certainly have their place.

I’ve seen this type used in telephone work a lot.

I wouldn’t touch cheap knockoffs with a 20 foot pole. They cut or nick the wires, or don’t hold securely.

And with any connector, you need to use the right size for the wire you’re using. I’ve tried using a too-small Scotchlok and nearly cut the wire in half.

Wire nuts are also a compression connector, and if installed correctly work as well as crimp connectors. Personally I wouldn’t use plastic-only wire nuts

As to why electricians don’t use solder, I don’t really know. Part of it could be electrical code, it specifies all sorts of stuff. Part of could be if a solder joint heats up enough, it can let go. That should never happen, but things go wrong, and planning for failure is a good idea. Part of it is probably time, wire nuts and crimps are faster. And time is money for a pro.

@blaineg @eonfifty Electricians are often working at the jobsite before the electricity is hooked up. Because, you know… they’re generally the ones that do that. (Although the wire-nut work is usually later.)

@blaineg @eonfifty Not to mention, a solder connection doesn’t isolate those wires from others nearby.

@eonfifty @walarney Nice tool, but does anyone still use them?

@cinoclav @eonfifty Yes, but you followup a solder joint with insulation, usually heatshrink tubing or electrical tape.

@blaineg @eonfifty Nope. All batteries now.

@eonfifty in stationary environments on solid conductor wire scotchlok connectors are fine, as long as they are properly sized to create a secure physical connection. So they are good in low voltage wiring, and the similar crimp on telephone splices @blaineg shared are good for the same reason, telephone wire is usually solid conductor and isn’t moving. They are not great for something like vehicle wiring for two reasons: vehicle wiring is a stranded conductor, and the scotchlok metal piece will just cut strands instead of biting into the solid wire. Also, the vehicle wiring is subject to vibration which can weaken or break the connection.

Wire nuts are similar. They are great for solid conductor wires when appropriately sized. The connection tapers inside so it physically twists and tightens the wires together, and it insulates the connection with no additional steps required. So it’s faster and easier than soldering, and aside from the time is money factor there is the added bonus that when you need to change out that light fixture you don’t have to either do a bunch of work to undo it or cut the wires and start over. But don’t use them on stranded wire, mostly for the same reasons as scotchlok. The twisting will break conductors and the physical bond will not be secure, so a failure down the road is possible.

@blaineg Those with a clue use the insulation. The average homeowner would burn their house down. You know how stupid people are.

@cinoclav True, but they’ll probably also burn themselves with the soldering iron, and/or make a cold solder joint, so that poor house is doomed anyways.

What’s wrong with this picture?

@djslack @eonfifty I’m surprised, considering today’s topic, @blaineg didn’t post a pic of a Scotchlok crimpers!

Designed specifically for Scotchlok connectors to eliminate the risk of crushing the connector.

@blaineg She’s definitely going to have a cold solder joint.

But that cold solder joint will prevent her from melting that pci connector.

@blaineg @djslack @eonfifty PS: I don’t use Scotchlok connectors in my car builds. Although 3M claims the connectors are “sealed”, it’s far from a reliable hermetic seal.

The influences of motion, vibration, temperature extremes, affect the connector’s seal. Road grime, rain, oil, gasoline… all that nasty stuff will invade the connector oxidizing the conductors and creating a poor or open circuit.

I’ve encountered perhaps dozens of (automotive) electrical issues where the culprit was a poorly sealed Scotchlok. The Chinasian clones are even worse.

@blaineg @walarney
I had a butane powered soldering iron, and I think there are battery powered ones too. But after reading your response, soldering does seem like a bad idea. If you had to repair or replace something, unsoldering would be a pain, and cutting could leave you with wires that are too short.

@blaineg @walarney
/image Roy Underhill

Unless that drill is too modern for him.

@djslack
What would you use for stranded AC wires? I ask because I’ve installed light fixtures that have stranded wires and the packaging included wire nuts. I wrapped the stranded wires clockwise around the solid house wiring, and then screwed the wire nut on clockwise as well. The connection seemed solid, but I remember little strands of the stranded wire breaking off.

@blaineg
The toy dinosaur in the background isn’t in focus?
/image plastic toy velociraptor

@eonfifty I feel I should first say I’m not an electrician. I might should have said that in my first post. I could also be at least partially wrong, as I found out when I fact checked for this post.

In my mind, there are a couple of options. A good crimp connection can be a fine choice for both stranded and solid wire as long as it can be appropriately sized to both wires.

You could also solder (or I suppose use a butt connector) a pigtail of solid wire to the end of a stranded wire and then connect it using wire nuts if you need to add it into an existing wire nut connection. Something I’ve done once that may or may not be recommended is strip the stranded wire, give it a little twist to keep it neat, and then tin it with solder. Then it’s essentially a solid wire and could go in a wire nut like a solid wire. But I have no idea if that’s legit or not, it just seemed like a good theory.

If you believe the Family Handyman, they state in this article to strip an additional 1/8" of the stranded wire so that it extends past the solid wires and then wire nut as usual. I’m not sure I believe that because you’ll still likely break some strands, but I imagine they have at least one lawyer that would fuss at them for writing unsafe content.

Further research shows that this contractor forum has the same advice so it may be legit.

I also found these neat looking Wago connectors that state they are the ideal connector for connecting stranded wire to solid, but I know nothing about them.

@eonfifty FWIW, wire nuts on stranded wire, and even stranded to solid connections is within code for AC electrical installations. But the all plastic wire nuts are garbage. Ideal (brand name) makes an excellent quality wire nut with spiral metal inserts. They’re inexpensive and last decades. Get an assortment package and keep them on hand. Maybe $10 for a hundred or so assorted sizes.

@djslack
I’ve never considered crimping household power before, but the cramped spaces for such connections, i.e. electrical junction boxes, makes using a crimping tool tough. You can do it, but it will be too easy to do it wrong and not notice.
Tinning the stranded wire is an awesome! idea. But, if the wire strands aren’t copper (I’ve encountered a lot silver-colored stranded wire I suspect to be aluminum), soldering is difficult.
I can see making the stripped end of the stranded longer than the solid in that the wire nut’s threads will draw the stranded wires up and around the solid wire. It seems legit to me. I’d try it.
Those Wago connectors look like the future. If they work, and the picture is accurate, that’d be awesome.

PANS! GLANDS! CRAYONS! AWESOME!

@ruouttaurmind
Yeah, wire nuts are the standard, but I’ve never encountered a wire nut that is plastic only. Granted, I haven’t bought wire nuts in more than 10 years, but I have noticed a trend towards metal conservation in general, and while I am shocked and appalled to learn from you that plastic only wire nuts exist, I’m not surprised.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

@djslack @eonfifty I’ve used Wago connectors at work a few times. They’re easy to use and seem to be pretty reliable.

@blaineg She failed her first IPC test.

Ouch!

@djslack @eonfifty @ruouttaurmind And now you’re learning about the problem with taking advice from a goat! I’m a know-it-all, but I don’t know everything.

I didn’t post the Scotchlok crimpers because I didn’t know about them. Well, that’s not quite true, I knew about the yellow handled pair, but had forgotten about them. But the fancy one with the pouch is new to me.

But it makes perfect sense there’s a dedicated crimper for them. And your point about crushing the Scotchlok connector is well taken. They are easy to crimp with normal pliers, but I have seen gorillas ram the conductive blade clean through the plastic body.

Each of these various connector types has a whole lot of engineering behind them, including designing the crimpers for them.

And that’s the problem with the generic knockoffs. Usually there’s no engineering behind them, they just make something that LOOKS like the original, without having any understanding of WHY it works, or what materials were used. So you wind up with cargo cult connectors.

@djslack @eonfifty @ruouttaurmind I’m not an electrician either, I’m an electronics tech. I know how to build reliable electrical/electronic gear, but I don’t know beans about the National Electrical Code (NEC) which is the bible for electricians. The NEC isn’t quite law, but it sure gets cited by it. I have done connections to building wiring, up to 3 phase 480, but my work had to be checked by a licensed electrician.

djslack, are you sure we’re on the internet? You examined your position, found contradictory information, and posted an update.

I’ve always used wirenuts to join stranded and solid wires. My approach has been to strip and tightly twist the stranded wire, then wrap it around the solid wire (since the stranded is usually smaller). But go with what the Code says.

While I would prefer to use normal crimp connectors for vehicle wiring, I’ve had good success with Scotchlok connectors as well. Yes, I’ve had problems too, but the 20 year job I mentioned above was on a dirt bike, and it’s hard to find a more abusive environment than that. Back in '93 (so I guess it’s really 26 years) I installed street legal lighting on my Honda XR600R and the blue (18-16 gauge) Scotchlok tap connectors were used in several places. I just sold the bike to a friend last year, and they’re still doing their job. 3M does spec those for stranded as well as solid.

Having said that, the butt crimp connectors provide a much larger contact area, so there’s a definite mechanical and electrical advantage.

And in either case, the silicone filled connectors, or filling them yourself with dielectric grease, does a lot for weatherproofing. And now as I type that, I remember that I did use dielectric grease on the XR600 project.

@djslack Your PCI connector comment reminds me of a facepalm moment. A cow-orker was telling me I was being way to fussy about my specifications for the the number and type of PCI & PCI Express slots on a new motherboard, and I should just use the company’s standard Dell desktop, because “You can add the slots later.”

We looped through that several times, but I was never able to penetrate their thick skull with reality. They wandered off still insisting that “You can add the slots later.”

@eonfifty I’ve got a very old house, and I’ve run into the short wire problem a few times, its a real PITA.

@eonfifty I missed the dinosaur!

And in case someone asks:
https://www.thinkgeek.com/product/156d/

Or should I have saved that for another day?

@Bretterson @djslack @eonfifty I haven’t used the Wago connectors myself, but I’ve heard a lot of good stuff about them.

If you scroll further down the Wago page, I’ve used similar terminal blocks (but from a different German company) for building industrial automation equipment. Great stuff.

I was using so many of them at the time that I ground a screwdriver, and then a power screwdriver tip, to be a perfect fit for the terminal block screws.

@blaineg @djslack
Couldn’t you add a PCI expansion card? I think those are a thing.
/image add more pci connectors to motherboard

@eonfifty @ruouttaurmind I haven’t gone looking for all plastic wire nuts, but they seem to come with a lot of dimmers and switches and light fixtures I’ve bought. They go in the garbage, and I use real wire nuts.

@djslack @eonfifty You used an AGP card on purpose, didn’t you?

Of course you can add cards to slots, but what they were telling me was I could add more slots to the motherboard later on.

Oh, if you mean a card expansion box, yes, they exist, but they have drawbacks including cost.

@djslack @eonfifty Looks like I timed out on my edit, and I lost most of my reply. Maybe I’m too long-winded? Naw, that couldn’t be it.

My AGP comment is about the first photo that’s not there anymore. I thought you were pulling my leg with it: ‘Sure you can stuff an AGP card into a PCI slot.’

The conversation was with one of the IT people, and they were trying to persuade me to use their standard Dell desktop, which was completely unsuitable for the job. Even if I could find a Dell with the hardware I need, they have a habit of changing everything inside the box while claiming it’s the same computer. They’re kind of the Forrest Gump of computers, you never know what you’re going to get.

I’m in a weird place with computers. We make X-ray detectors and tubes, and most of our customers build them into medical equipment. And because of all the regulation, the medical business moves slowly. So a lot of what I’m dealing with is 10 years or more behind the rest of the world, but I also use current stuff.

I still need to support PCI (not PCIe) cards for some applications, and PCI slots are becoming increasingly rare.

I can’t count how many times I’ve heard that RS-232 serial ports are dead, but I can’t function without them. Most of my computers have 1-5 of them. Some have 8-16. Strangely enough it’s no problem at all to find motherboards with serial ports on them.

I even found a new laptop with a serial port a couple of months ago. I thought they were gone for good.

@blaineg @Bretterson @djslack @eonfifty Ring has been including Wago connectors with their video doorbells for a few years. That was my first experience with them. They are a bit bulky, but seemed to do their job fine. And super easy to use.

@blaineg
I had to edit because the “image” tag came up with something I didn’t want. I’ll blame the for that .
As for losing posts, it’s happened to me enough that if I’m writing a long one, I’ll write it in a text editor then copy and paste into the forum. Doing that also allows me some extra editing time

@eonfifty Yea, I do the same thing with long posts. The only problem is sometimes I don’t realize I’m writing a long post until it’s too late.

@blaineg I’ve done a new project recently that included putting in an RS-232 port. They ain’t dead, especially if you need long-distance control.

@blaineg @djslack @eonfifty PCI bridges sometimes make sense for connecting obsolete hardware to modern systems. There is an unavoidable latency penalty, but the older stuff can usually tolerate that because the older systems were slower in all respects except for that bus latency.

The modern processor and memory has so much more bandwidth than the old stuff that the system can be filled with those cards that used to be considered “state of the art” and “high performance”.

The classic demonstration system would have a new PC connected to a PCIe expansion card cage with a 64 bit PCI bus expansion card cage, with a 32 bit PCI bus with an ISA bus hanging off that, with a parallel port driving an S100 bus with a card built in 1976.

@blaineg @djslack @hamjudo
That makes sense. Parallel ports are faster than serial ports. Why 1976, or do you mean the late 70s in general?

@djslack @eonfifty @hamjudo So, something like this?

@cinoclav Thanks, it’s been fun to do. And I’m enjoying the conversations.

@PocketBrain Yes, that tool is generally a lousy wire stripper too, because the jaws don’t overlap like they do on a real stripper.

It’s a shame it wound up as the header picture. That one is truly my fault.

@blaineg And it has other uses as well. As noted on the packages, keeping sparkplug boots from seizing is one of them. Obviously you wouldn’t want something conductive around high voltage.

In the bad old days, you’d use a dielectric grease on the points in your distributor.

Basically anything that needs lubrication but is around electrical stuff.

@blaineg Thanks! I am replacing a rotted well house thing at my new house and it had a breaker box that had become a nest for termites or ants or something. I was cleaning it up and my understanding of the grease was what you said so it is nice to know for sure. (There is a modern circuit breaker for it in the house but I wanted to keep it anyway.)

@eonfifty Wrong tool!

@blaineg
FWIW, it didn’t work, and I carefully used a utility knife instead

@blaineg maybe I should go to the ATM machine and use my card and pin number to get money to purchase some of these IDC connectors.

@djslack Yes, exactly!