No Earth Wire On Plug Cable

[le freak 1]

Hi all, just got a djm600 wirh euro 2 prong type plug on it, I have cut this plug off and stuck a uk plug on, it works fine but it has no earth wire yellow/green on the cable, so the plug just has the blue and brown wires wired up..........it might be working ok bur I would like to know if this is saf

e to use like this?? Cheers for any help

[McCardle 1]

Yes, thats ok. If manufacturers require an earth connection, then it will be present as a third wire within the mains flex. If only two wires are present in the cable then it means that the appliance is effectively double insulated, which means all of the 'live' mains components inside are either encapsulated in resin, or there is no easy way that any live parts can break loose and touch the metal case.

 

A lot of mixers are unearthed these days, probably something to do with preventing earth 'hum' loops, or perhaps just cutting down on a few euro-cents worth of mains cable . Either way, its not uncommon for a lot of appliances to only have 2-core flex, even those with metal cases.

 

Another sure way of checking is to look at the mains label or printing on the back of the mixer which shows the voltage etc, if there is a symbol which shows a square box within another square box, then the mixer is indeed double insulated. The symbol will look similar to this one

 

http://forum.sensiseeds.com/uploads/52266/Double_insulation_symbol.png

 

P.S Make sure that the plug you have just fitted has a 3A fuse - A 2A fuse would be even better but are less common and harder to source. A 3A fuse will ensure that you don't fall foul the next time its PAT tested.

Edited August 1, 2012 by McCardle

[fester 0]

P.S Make sure that the plug you have just fitted has a 3A fuse - A 2A fuse would be even better but are less common and harder to source. A 3A fuse will ensure that you don't fall foul the next time its PAT tested.

 

 

That's an excellent point.

 

I don't know if it's just me who was guilty but for a long time I used to just sling my IEC cables into my cable box and use the first cable that came to hand for anything with an IEC socket.

I totally fell foul the first time I had my gear PAT tested, when the tester removed the plug top to check the fuse was appropriate to the equipment it was being plugged into.

 

Of course nowadays, in these days of people calling the cable police if you have the slightest hint of a wire showing anywhere, the majority of my rig is pre-wired with correct lengths of cable and the correct fuse. Any kit I can't pre-wire into a harness, such as my haze machine, has it's IEC cable stored away in the flightcase with the machine.

[djmick 0]

I,m pretty sure in the old days musicians would remove the earth cable to eliminate "buzz" or have i got that wrong?

[le freak 1]

cheers for help guys.... i was guilty with the iec cables aswell , ive got a sticker on the cables now with what bit of kit it is meant for, makes life easy

[McCardle 1]

I,m pretty sure in the old days musicians would remove the earth cable to eliminate "buzz" or have i got that wrong?

 

Yes, they did and unfortunately in some cases it was a modification which proved fatal. During the 1960's to 80's there were many high profile cases of singers getting electrocuted whilst on stage, when the body of their (wired) microphones became live. In the event of a fault with the amplifier, or moisture ingress, and the absence of a mains earth meant that the electricity took the easiest path to Earth.......through the braided screens on all of the audio leads and eventually through the vocalist!. Some of them, like Leslie Harvey, never got a chance for an Encore :ads:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Harvey

 

Thanks to common sense, hum isolators, earth lift switches and RCD's it doesn't happen much these days, although there are still a few examples on the live music circuit (pardon the pun). Here is another example, fortunately it wasn't fatal.

 

AKfi_uBlEBM

Edited August 12, 2012 by McCardle