Breaking quite a few conductors in a 7 strand "solid" wire leaves very few intact strands, and each break has the potential to arc, causing heat and fire.
You have a cord for your generator that has power on an exposed male plug? That's the stupidest and most dangerous thing I've heard of in quite a while. You really have no clue about electrical safety do you? Please tell us you have a transfer switch!
You just don't get do you? Nobody has a problem that you made an extension cord, but you were too cheap to do it properly. If you had spent another $25 and gone to a real electrical supplier, you could have had 6/3 SO and NOBODY would have a care, and you would be safe!
Here is the extension cord I made for my Miller 172:
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I wanted the wire label to be visible. The plug is a standard, older
30A dryer plug with 2 hots and a safety ground. Newer dryer installations in the US use 2 hots, neutral, & safety ground. You do not need the neutral and could tape it back like the red wire from your welder.
The receptacle is a NEMA 6-50 in a metal handy box. A NEMA 6-50 plug would be a good choice for your welder mains lead.
10/3 SJ flexible cord carries the current. It is typical for extension cords but not meant for permanent installation.
The strain relief at the box is a good idea since the cord gets tossed around the shop (and shoved through the laundry room cat door) a lot.
This cord would work well for your welder as it can easily handle the recommended 30A. If you made a short adaptor using a NEMA 6-50 plug, a foot of SJ 10/3 cord, and a 120V / 20A plug, you could then use either 240V or 120V.
30' of SJ 10/3: $30
3/4" (IIRC) strain relief: $30 ( had to go to an electric supply house)
As you can see, it wasn't cheap, but is safe and works great.
The only thing I would do differently is use a box cover intended for surface mount boxes, which would not have sharp edges like my box cover did. I bent the edges over and ground them smooth, but still have to watch out not to cut things (like the cord) on the edge of the box cover.
Hope this helps.
Jeff Danztler
P.S. Gary Coffman is a wealth of knowledge--I figured out how to do this after reading some of his older posts on wiring a Miller180SD.
Busy with life. SOld the TJ last July to set some other things straight, after being laid off with the tech sector tanking. Working again now, and getting started ASAP on building a new Jeep.
so keep those shop monkeys off your wire. my wire will stand up fine to any reasonable usage.
_you_ might be to stupid to know that you need to plug everything in AFTER youve tripped the breaker and BEFORE you crank the generator but dont traject that onto me. there is absolutely nothing wrong with anything ive done if used properly. the only way it could be dangerous would be in the hands of an idiot but an idiot can ruin _anything_.
He doesn't have to. He's not the one that may be violating the code. Safety should be a positive proof kind of thing - I know that I'm safe vs. I'm not sure if this is unsafe.
"Hasn't broken yet" and "Safe enough for use" are two different things, at the complete opposite ends of responsibility.
Nope. From the ground up....will be starting with whatever I can get my hands on *cheap*, probably a 90-91 YJ, and doing a complete build into an off-road rig. Custom axles, suspension, drivetrain, etc...Starting with a cheap Jeep for the frame, body, and incidentals, mostly. Been down the road of monthly payments and babying a daily driver before...won't be doing that with an offroader again. will build as cashflow allows. Thanks anyway though. ;-)
sweet! i recently pick up a retired M880 with 42,000 original miles (parked in a military hanger for 2 decades).
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the v8, 727auto, full time
4x4 with high/low lock, dana 70 rear end and dana 60 front left full width is going to build one _awesome_ cj8. im currently using it to haul my rhino around but once my rubicon sells (ive pretty much given up at this point though) i plan on getting a new cummins diesel dodge for hauling the rhino, and MNKT will be used for my cj8 project.
How are you sure? Did you check the code, or have a licenced electrian check it out? If you didn't do either of these things, then you don't know that it is safe.
Article 334.10 / 334.12 Uses permitted / not permitted for NM cable These 2 articles do not say that NM can be used as a extension cord. They also do not say it cannot be used.
334.40 General idea here is that romex has to be supported. I guess you could argue that the cable is fished.
400.7 Flexible cords and cables. Uses Permitted 400.7(a)(6) Connection of utilization equipment to facilitate frequent interchange.
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