On Mon, 18 Feb 2019 10:10:12 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

This could, of course, have been corrected by simply putting a penny
in the fuse :-)

I had an interesting experience in that line.

I wanted an overhead light in the sewing room, and I wanted to be able
to plug my iron into the ceiling so that the cord wouldn't drag over
what I was trying to flatten. (I've seriously considered buying an
off-the-grid iron, but they are expensive and I don't know where to
buy the fuel.)

So the resident engineer bought a ceramic light fixture with an outlet
that could take high current, and connected it to the switched outlet
with a thick orange extension cord designed for high current, and cut
the cord to the exact length to minimize resistance. This provided a
safety factor, in that if the light was turned off, the iron was not
connected, and I always turn the light off when leaving a room. (A
habit that causes me some stress in places where the light is on a
motion detector. Especially when the switch I used to need to hit is
still in place.)

Fast forward a decade or so. He was putting dimmer switches on
various lights and I thought that here was the solution to just barely
bright enough to sew being way, way too bright for typing. And it
would also reduce the blue light at bedtime problem, since
incandescent lights (we still have a few stashed away) get redder when
operated below their designed voltage.

A couple of weeks later, I cleared off the ironing board and ironed a
shirt. When I turned the light off, the switch was hot enough to
hurt.

Oops. A dimmer switch is not designed to take high current. So now I
unplug the extension cord, plug in the iron, and then plug the
extension into an un-switched outlet.

I've learned that the key to inserting an electrical plug in the dark
is to feel for the round hole for the ground prong. With the tip of
the round prong in this hole, it's easy to rotate the two flat prongs
into the invisible slots.


--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/