w31_breaker
Borrowed a new P+B toggle circuit breaker form local IA to help with design of electrical stuff that is going in and behind passenger headrest
of our Europa XS monowheel.
I wanted to screw on a ring terminals to get better idea of space requirements.
Sounds easy enough. Grabbed my favorite #2 screwdriver and removed first
screw, the second one was unbelievably tight. I got it loose, but put a
crack in the plastic housing because the torque required to loosen the
screw distorted the lug. What an idiot, even though the factory should
have not tightened down the screw so tight, I should have just held the
lug with a pair of pliers to prevent any stress from being transmitted to
housing, instead of holding the housing and loosening the screw.
OK $25 mistake, won't let that happen again. Figured would let others in
on my mistake so it happens not to you.
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Since I am now the proud owner of a cracked P+B toggle breaker, even
though a little JB Weld could fix it, I decided to dissect. I never liked
the high factor of wigulation (feel) the toggle has on these units so
figured I needed a look. My business is copiers, and several times a year
I end up taking apart switches and relays to do field repair to get
machines going till I can obtain a new one. I am pretty aware of what
fails in electrical parts such as this.
WOW!!! If you ever wondered why a P+B non pull able breaker is around 5
bucks, and why a P+B toggle breaker is around $25, take a look inside.
There are close to 4 dozen parts on the toggle breaker!
From talking to people who have experience with these toggle breakers long
term, they acknowledge good reliability, but man are there a lot of things
in there that can fail. One thing I am pretty confident assuming, once
breaker is closed I think it will maintain a pretty reliable connection.
Trying to close contacts is a different story. It is a mechanical
nightmare that highly stresses many components. There are things that are
greased, and when it becomes well used and grease goes away from the
friction contact area and strategic plastic parts such as the white
plastic lever that connects the toggle with the main mechanism become
brittle, I can see a failure when trying to close contacts.
I went as far as reassembling the unit onto just one side, installed
bracing, bonded strategic pins, levers and springs so the unit can be
operated with half the cover is off!
Guess this is a leftover from when I was a kid playing with invisible V8s
and invisible radial aeroplane motors.
Impressive unit.
Y8-12-10
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Full size:
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