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Default Great open barrel crimper for Molex terminals

On 2010-07-03, Karl Townsend wrote:

"Ignoramus31310" wrote in message
...
I need to crimp a lot of Molex open barrel terminals for those servo
power supplies. I was kind of shocked to find a tool from Molex for
$269. But then I found item HWS16166 from

http://www.phoenixent.com/

It does a great job.

i


I've got one that's like a pair of pliers. I've been disapointed. Most
crimps are great, then I get one where the wire slides back out of the crimp
after a while. I started pulling on the just crimped connecter to test them
and it mostly solved the issue.

Most of the trouble is with 22 guage and smaller. Have you tried this tool
with this fine a wire and checked if they will pull out?


Part of the problem is getting terminals designed for the wire
gauge. There are usually two or three terminals to fit a given
connector body with different wire sizes and requiring a different nest
in the crimper. (In the AMP connectors of the DB-25 and similar series,
there are two pin sizes -- one with a tiny blue dot, the other with a
tiny red dot.)

Also -- avoid terminals which have a single 'U' instead of two.
The crimper should have separate zones for the two 'U's. The zone
closer to the pin crimps on the bare wire to make connection, and the
zone closer to the wire insulation end is intended to crimp only onto
the insulation to prevent vibration flex right behind the crimp which
leads to early failure.

Another problem is if the crimper does not have a ratchet to
force you to complete the crimp cycle before you relase the terminal.

If you can't get terminals and a crimper to precisely fit the
22 ga wire, do what I do:

1) Strip about 2-1/2 times the normal recommended length.

2) Twist the wire tighter as you pull the insulation clear.
(Start the strip with the stripper, but finish removing the
insulation by hand.)

3) Fold the stripped wire in half so it fills more of the
space in the terminal, insert that and crimp.

Oh yes -- another thing to consider. These open-sided terminals
are made to use on stranded wire -- not solid wire. Avoid solid for
this kind of wiring.

For the closed tube style with insulation plastic on them (not
usually in connector bodies) the size of wire is indicated by the color
of the plastic sleeve -- cycling through three colors normally.

ga color
---- -----
26-24 Yellow

22-18 Red
16-14 Blue
12-10 Yellow

8 Red
6 Blue
4 Yellow
2 Red
0 (1-0) Blue
2-0 Yellow
3-0 Red
4-0 Blue

The group of three is the most commonly useful size, but I have
AMP brand terminals and crimpers (not for sale) for almost all of the
sizes listed in my personal collection. (Anything from 8 ga up is
hydraulically crimped, the others are manual -- though the common group
is also available with a pneumatic crimper for production runs.

Good Luck,
DoN.

--
Email: | Voice (all times): (703) 938-4564
(too) near Washington D.C. | http://www.d-and-d.com/dnichols/DoN.html
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