Then I could get into the welding and specialty clamps, all of which do their jobs well, but are out of the context of the discussion. Many of these I inherited (some pre-war or war surplus), and others picked up at swap meets and yard sales. Handy for grabbing bus bars, but I don’t trust the current capacity at the working end. The biggest I have is the size of a small jumper cable clamp, and work about as well (not very, for significant current over significant time) and has a bug-bolt connector for 5mm (4Ga) wire. I also keep a few of the larger sizes on hand. I also use telephone clips (end grab with insulation piercing pins), small smooth jaw clips, several flavours of hook, and probes (also bought a pack of them a number of years ago-I think is was 10 in the box?). The other jaw might as well be made of acetyl for all of the current carrying capacity it adds. These are ok up to about 5A, and don’t cook until about 10A or more, as long as the wired jaw has several points in good contact. I just color the hoods with vinyl tape for ID. I have a stock of assorted clips, and bought a bag (500) of medium sized (15mm jaw length, serrated) about 20 years ago that I have not yet gone through. Other colors mean going to stranded hookup wire, which is less flexible, though smaller. I think the lead I use is about 16Ga (1.2mm^2). If I have it on hand, I use test lead wire (heavy ultraflexible insulation over moderate sized fine stranded conductors) which is usable to 10A reliably, and 20A for a good period. They all cost more than parts and I have to remake them anyway. I haven’t bought or used commercially made assembly in years. I try not to use them at all, but they are so handy I keep them around. That’s what I ordered them under, many companies know exactly what you’re talking about. Going through the manuals, I found the larger missing ones referred to as crocodile clips. When I searched for alligator clips, I got the standard ones you see above. anyway, I had to go through and repair and/or replace this equipment and found several probes missing these croc clips. They become easily lost or misplaced when equipment is shared, say in a lab or production place, where one piece of equipment is shared by many. I learned this years ago, these clips simply slide of the wire and can be replaced with other attachments. Many differential probes use them, such as differential probes. an example, if you use various probes that have the large clip for ground or common, then that is the “croc clip”. Most people have probably used them and not known what the true name is. “We”, as in, everyone I have known or sold them, call them “alligator clips”.īut, and here is where things get interesting, there is a “crocodile clip”. Posted in Ask Hackaday Tagged Ask Hackaday, connectors, crocodile clips Post navigationįunny you should mention that. Do you have any rules of thumb for how much current to pass through crocodile clips? What do you clip them to and what do you avoid? How do you manage the tangle? Do you just trust them when they come from the factory or have you been bitten too? What alternatives have you considered, and how’s it working? Or is there some ultra-premium crocodile clip manufacturer out there that lets us trade off pain for mere money? How thick is the wire inside your crocs? Are you sure that it’s beefy enough to take the current you’re passing through it? Are you sure the pointy teeth are making enough contact with whatever you’re clipping them to? Of course not. Even thinking about this now makes me want to pull back their little rubber booties just to make sure.īut intermittents are not the only source of trouble. When I buy new ones, I check them all before mixing them in with the known-goods. All of our croco-clips have been disassembled, manually inspected, and many of them soldered together. And what’s worse is the one with the loose wires that sometimes make contact with the spring-clip body and sometimes not.Īfter an hour-long debugging session about twelve years ago now, such an intermittent croc caused us to make a lifelong vow. When wrote in asking what we use instead of crocodile clips, he included a photo that sent a chill down my spine, from a review of some clips on Amazon. But they come loose, they can have intermittent contacts, and we’re not even sure if there is such a thing as a current rating for them. I love the range of pretty colors that crocodiles come in, as well as the easy ability to just clip on to the side of a PCB, or any old loose wire. Nothing is so quick to lash together a few half-baked prototype boards on your desk, but nothing ends up in such a tangle so quickly, either. I have a love/hate relationship with the crocodile clip.
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