My Wago connectors arrived
(midwest.social)
DominusOfMegadeus
DullstersIn my house we use wire nuts and die in an electrical fire like real men.
It's the only way to get into electrician Valhalla.
Only youtube elechickens install wirenuts correctly.
I just twist the wires together and masking tape them in place. Only had 3 fires this year!
Nothing dull about Wagos. It's the dullards that still use wire nuts.
Yep. Wagos are too cool for me!
Hey friend,
Check if you can get the 2273 series for permanent connections.same principles but push in and therefore way more compact.
Plus at least here getting the sizes individually will save you plenty money over a projects lifetime (i.e. greb a 100 piece box of the five connectors and several more of the two and three and you'll be good to go!)
Have fun! :)
Those ones are cheaper but only good for single core wires, since there's no way to turn off the pressure for the connections
The twisted together ones would break if you tried to twist them, unless you tin them of course
True!
Get ready to have to explain to every other person that they don't cause fires/melt and are actually safer than wire nuts. Then still have to listen to that one electrician "well actually, this one time, when wiring for a band camp...."
That attitude is going away. The elechickens are adotpting them because they are faster to use than a correctly installed wire nut. And time is money. Plus, there is less callback rework because some apprentice screwed up the wire nuts in that one box.
I think the biggest selling point is no more floating neutrals with poorly installed wire nuts. If it's in and locked down, it's good.
Some electricians are still installing solid aluminum wiring in new builds in southern Arizona. Due to the heat the sheathing contracts, exposing the bare wire inside the electrical box. Fairly recently a new development essentially burned down before they even finished building it.
Just because they're an electrician doesn't mean they actually know what they're doing.
There's always someone who knows a guy who knows a guy who's son's ex-wife's piano teacher from 3rd grade's dog who LITERALLY DIED because of [thing that's been proven safe time and time again] and the doctor/emt/firefighter/cop/lawyer/pope SAID they would BE ALIVE if they had been doing EXACT OPPOSITE of safe!
I just interrupt people who start with that by saying "no you don't and if they told you that then they're lying to you" because no you absolutely did not hear an EMT say not to wear a seat belt because they're actually more dangerous, somehow.
How many did you actually need for your current project?
Because, I almost bought this, but then reminded myself I only needed two.
They're just so cool, it's hard to resist.
You only needed two that time. Next time you need one, you’ve already got the whole box there ready to go.
Honestly, maybe four of the 221s, and a few others. I always succumb to the value prop and buy more than I need. They’re just much more elegant, and SO much easier to use than the twisty caps. And I like having extras of this kind of thing on hand. It’s such a good feeling when something comes up, and you’re like, “I have a thing for that!” (Like, I have a random old replacement window latch that’s been sitting in a toolbox for 20 years, and I was just messing with the latch that just broke on the bathroom window, and the light of realization shone down from on high)
• Wagos are a great, replaceable and affordable way to connect wires
• still use wire nuts bc it makes the happy go zoom when I twist the wires correctly.
My increasingly arthritic fingers make the “why are you doing this to us over and over?!” sound as I attempt to twist stubborn Romex 12/2 wires together.
Not to say you shouldn't use wagos because I do, but even elechickens use a pair lineman pliers to twist all the wires correctly before installing the wire nut.
I was generalizing. But I use my fingers to both hold the wires in one hand, and manipulate the pliers in the other. I can’t avoid using fingers. It’s a personal failing.
When I discovered wago connectors my smart home journey changed completely! Stupid wire nut connectors are so damn bulky and flaky when installing larger smart switches and relays. Wagos rock!
Your next evolution involves ferrules. Get a ferrule kit and up your freaking stranded wire connector game!!
tinned leads are wagos best friend, can't pull out or poorly crimp a solidified mass of soldered strands
You shouldn't directly clamp soldered stranded wires. They will eventually loosen up because the solder doesn't hold its form under compression, then get warm, and then the problem worsens until you potentially get a fire at your terminals.
My 35 year old Pace soldering course would have bored you to death about tinning wires.
I left that course and had a senior electrical engineer step into the conversation regarding the dangers of solder creep.
Standardization is pretty metal 🤘
After discovering these myself, I'll never use anything else! By far the best way to connect wires.
Hey all, I'm the kinda guy who does a stupid amount of projects ... What's the benefit of these besides being quick to connect ? Why not solder?
Solder should never be used for automotive or household wiring, or any very high current usage.
Screw terminals, crimp connectors, or wire connectors (lever nut, like the wago here, or wire nuts) should be used as appropriate.
Lots of people make the mistake of using solder when they shouldn't, and it can fail after a while, causing disconnects, heat, and/or fire.
And people are starting to recommend marine crimp connectors because they are better. And having used a few in my boat for a pair of heavy draw tolling motors, I got admit the anti-corrosion goo and built in heat shrink makes pretty sweet to use.
Sure, and you can wire your whole house in 6 gauge wire, but sometimes the cost isn't worth the extra effort.
I'd use them on an RV, or maybe specific automotive instances, but if it's just something behind the dashboard or in a passenger compartment, standard quick connections are just fine.
Solder is ideal for a permanent connection. Not all connections need to be permanent. For example, installing lighting in your house where the romex is pulled, and you're needing to connect the fixture. Solder isn't used for those connections, it would be a wire nut or wago. And the wago is both more secure and easier to verify.
Oddly solder isn't best in most situations. Vibration and/or thermal cycling can cause solder to fail where crimps, wago or twist cannot fail. I learned it from Wil Prowse the solar/whole house battery expert where he compared crimps to solder.
It seemed obvious in retrospect because I have fixed many old electronics where the problem was a cold solder joint that needed a touch up with a soldering iron. Decades of thermal cycling from use cause micro fractures in the solder that get worse and worse.
And even if it is permanent, AC wiring can heat up and mess with solder, so crimping or lever nuts are preferred.
By the time your wire reaches 200⁰ needed for your solder to melt, your insulation would already be burning. That's not a plausible scenario, or you need to deliberately make a bad solder joint, cutting half the strands in the wire so it overheats in that particular place.
No, this is not true. Solder is brittle and any poor joint can cause a lot of heat. You should never use solder in household wiring.
Crimps, screw terminals, or properly rated electrical connectors only.
The superior technique is solder the strands together at the tip of the wire, then plug it into Wago so you can disconnect it easily when you need to add another wire.
Or well, crimp the ends and connect to a busbar with bolts, but that's for wires where you calculate your electricity in kilowatts.
Solder can become a cold joint or melt. Typically with AC or cable connections you either want to use a crimp or a lever nut (wago). Replacable recepticles in houses used to use wire nuts, but Wagos give better holding force, work with stranded and solid, and you can get ones that have way more connections like a bus bar.
Way to go!
Way to go!
I was looking at that but I needed 50 of the 221's but im never looking back, 3d printed little waterproof cases for them as they are all outside.
What are you building with these? I see 600V on the packaging.
I’m rewiring my house with modern wire and outlets.
So 120V and 240V stuff. Be careful :) if you don't have it I'd recommend running some cat6e cabling while you're there.
Don’t run network twisted-pair cables in parallel with electrical wires if at all possible. The magnetic field produced by the AC in the electric lines causes packet loss
It's also against the NEC in the US, I think. People expect low voltage wires to be low voltage and handle them as such. If a high voltage somehow ends up touching a low voltage bare wire, your friendly Ethernet cable could turn deadly.
In general, yes.
Wago? We always called they "wayco" connectors. Was I wrong the whole time?
Wandel & Goltermann is a German manufacturer.
Wago is pronounced like virgo except the "vir" part sounds like the "vu" in vulture. Vuh-go, basically. But it makes sense that English native speakers would naturally pronounce it as "waygo".
wtf, waygo is correct or w-ahhh-go (as a German) Where’s the vuh coming from in Wandel?
Ist für englische Muttersprachler geschrieben.
Ahhh also works instead of uh, I guess.
Ze German W and the English W are quite different, though, so that was my attempt to get that across. 😉
naja, die kriegen das schon hin irgendwie 😀
If I remember right harbor freight has like a store brand item for wago connectors
Im in the market for some of these, so ty!
Oof. I love me some HF but I'm not sure I'd buy electrical splice/connectors there.
Edit: at least not for mains voltages. For other projects I'm sure they're fine.
Glad I could help ☺️ hope you have a lovely day!
