Crappy strain relief

real_aurgathor

Just noticed this on a cordless drill battery charger:

While the charger can be taken apart, it has sunk screws with security heads, beyond the reach of a usual bit. 🙁

Somewhat-Reticent

How old?

Dustyn

real_aurgathor Epoxy resin and some heat shrink tubing? I’m not an electrician, just thinking that this could work?

real_aurgathor

Dustyn

That is at the level of the duck tape….. 😉

I plan to open up the charger, remove the broken portion, and add some additional strain relief (several layers of heat shrink tubing) to ensure that it won’t happen again. Will post some pictures when I get there.

Somewhat-Reticent How old?

Probably at least 5, but still – I have 20+ years old tools that use properly made cords that seem to be immune to this type of decay.

The thing is that this is my favored drill for driving screws because of it’s good balance, relatively low speed, but very reasonable amount of torque. And I have 2 batteries for it, so I really don’t want to junk it even though I have another, much newer cordless drill. but it’s not as good for driving screws because it spins significantly faster.

Thane_Bitter

real_aurgathor Been there, I have often cut the so called strain reliever and reused it with silicone or heat fusion over a better cord with a higher amount of rubber (ie so it actually will flex like a cord should). So much vinyl plastic cords which are weak when hot (or overloaded) and stiff and brittle when cold. Often there is so much flex with the OEM cord right at that point the copper strands break which increases the temperature which damages the plastic which means more break and then you see sparks, smoke and the charger doesn’t charge one day (or you have a fire).

Security screws should be outlawed, there is no reason for them other to further screw over the consumer.

HooRU

Strain relief is a sore subject for me. Rarely is it designed to actually work. I’ve been through so many USB cables. Were I the engineer… Thank you China for the great quality of your products. SMH.