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Wire placement in socket terminals

Baldyhugh

Hi

In past years, the design of socket outlet terminals were in my opinion quite good, being round tunnel type. This allowed, for example, two straight ends of a 2.5 t&e ring to lie side by side in the terminal and as the screw tightened, it pushed them together into the bottom of the terminal and both conductors were gripped equally. This created a good connection if you ask me. Any sockets I have used in Recent years have sort of a square terminal with slightly rounded sides. With two straight 2.5 conductors, I find that keeping one to each side of the terminal with the screw separating them down the middle gives the best connection as they are pushed into the corner of the terminal and cannot move. I’ve tried to keep them both in the centre but due to the flat bottom of the terminal one inadvertently slips to one side as it is tightened and doesn’t make a good connection. I’ve been viewing various online videos today due to having some spare time and it astounds me how many people just stuff the conductors in without even inspecting them afterwards to see if both conductors are equally connected. Some opt to double over  both 2.5’s thus creating 4 conductors in the terminal, to fill the terminal with copper, but my feeling is that it only creates a worse connection as you now have 4 conductors to adequately trap. Id be interested to hear others views on socket termination techniques and their opinions on accessory terminal design of late.

 

thanks in advance

 

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    I mostly use click accessories as my wholesaler only stocks two brands and the other ones aren’t great. The 2.5 live and neutral of a t&e usually aren’t much of a problem as they are fat enough when both pushed to the opposite ‘corners’ of the terminal to be trapped by the screw and are too big to slip up the side. I have also found that the cpc is more of a problem in 2.5 t&e due to its smaller csa. I experimented the other night as there wasn’t much on tv with doubling over both 1.5mm cpc’s and laying them flat side by side in the terminal so that there were essentially four conductors beside each other and they did lie quite neatly and stayed in place when the screw was tightened. I previously just both in straight (undoubled) and the screw pushed one to each side which was ok. They were still big enough that they didn’t slip up the side of the screw either. I’m not so keen on the ‘four in a row’ method as the screw is essentially being asked to grip four things equally instead of two but it was just an experiment. Why manufacturers changed from round terminals I’ll never know but I wish that they would go back!
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    I mostly use click accessories as my wholesaler only stocks two brands and the other ones aren’t great. The 2.5 live and neutral of a t&e usually aren’t much of a problem as they are fat enough when both pushed to the opposite ‘corners’ of the terminal to be trapped by the screw and are too big to slip up the side. I have also found that the cpc is more of a problem in 2.5 t&e due to its smaller csa. I experimented the other night as there wasn’t much on tv with doubling over both 1.5mm cpc’s and laying them flat side by side in the terminal so that there were essentially four conductors beside each other and they did lie quite neatly and stayed in place when the screw was tightened. I previously just both in straight (undoubled) and the screw pushed one to each side which was ok. They were still big enough that they didn’t slip up the side of the screw either. I’m not so keen on the ‘four in a row’ method as the screw is essentially being asked to grip four things equally instead of two but it was just an experiment. Why manufacturers changed from round terminals I’ll never know but I wish that they would go back!
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