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hansyolo

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Dear experts,

thank you for the opportunity to raise a question in your forum!

I am working on a private solution to wire up some of my furniture. I have created a wirring circuit which I belive is an parallel connection. However, as I do not have any electrical experience I am kindly asking you for a quick check and your feedback.

Does this wiring work at all and if so, is it a parallel or series connection?

Thank you very much!

By the way, it is a German source, therefore 240V.

Does this electrical wiring work? cable wiring.PNG - EletriciansForums.net
 
Yes if they are all paralleled together. Personally I would try and avoid so many joints but any joint should be enclosed so all conductors and connectors are contained. How is it being switched.
 
Dear westward10,

thank you very much for your reply. Yes, I agree there are many joints however please see (attached picture) that basically each of the four smaller circuits is installed in one component (box 1 to 4). Each box is independent from each other and can be moved, Therefore I will need all the joints to connect the boxes to each other.

So I understand from your post that this is a parallel circuit, right?

Thank you!

Does this electrical wiring work? cable wiring_2.PNG - EletriciansForums.net
 
Yes it is a parallel circuit. Moving the boxes may require additional connections for example, if you move box 3 you lose the link to box 1.
 
Yes, you are absolutely right. That's for example the reason why I also included so many Snap-In connectors, because I can move the boxes by the half lenght and still connect to the other Snap-In (see below picture). Each movement of the box is standardized to either the full length or half of the lenght. This way I can ensure continues power supply.

Does this electrical wiring work? cable wiring_variation.PNG - EletriciansForums.net
 
Would you allow me one more question please?

If I now would connect a box two times (like below in the picture, which is technically possible because of the modularity), would it cause a short circuit? My guess is that it would cause a short circuit.

Thank you!

Does this electrical wiring work? short_circuit.PNG - EletriciansForums.net
 
What are the light fittings (LED)?
As its furniture is it not possible to install a LED driver at source and install a 2core 12/24v circuit throughout, in parallel as shown?
 
Hi DefyG. There will be no lights installed. The "Consumer" icon is basically a regular socket and I am planning to plug various devices to it (e.g. TV, console, Monitor, Charger, etc.), which will basically sit in the box.
 
No it will not create a short circuit as it is all parallel.
 
There is a safety issue with the connectors being used bi-directionally, i.e. where any connector might be used as an inlet or an outlet. This is not normally acceptable for domestic equipment because even if the internal connectors are suitable for either side (pins or receptacles) to be live, there is the possibility of connecting two supply cables together. I.e. suppose one Schuko feed cable is powering one pair of boxes and another is attached to the second pair. Then interconnect the two pairs of boxes and the second Schuko plug pins become live.

To prevent this, connectors on modular equipment are normally either power-in or power-out and the two are not interchangeable. E.g. with Neutrik Powercon, although the male and female are both sufficiently shrouded to allow either to be the source, there is a power-in version (blue) and a power-out version (grey) with different keys to prevent them being interconnected.
 
Hi, thanks for your explanation, however I must admit that I am still trying to understand the problem you mention.

Edit: The Snap In will be Female only. For all other connectors (blue ones) we will use a male connector. Does this solve the problem`?
 
No, that is exactly the root of the problem. In some positions power is flowing from male to female and in others female to male. Clearly with a normal household plug such as Schuko it is not acceptable to have power coming out of the male as the exposed metal pins would be live. But your non-directional use of connectors allows that to happen, if two input cables are attached to interconnected sections of furniture by mistake.

The normal method would be to have an inlet (male) and an outlet (female) connector mounted at each position, and interconnection cables with male and female ends. E.g. with IEC 60320 the cable feeding power into an appliance has a C13 socket connector that mates with a C14 inlet, then to loop the power back out a cable with a type E plug connector is inserted into a type F outlet.
 
Thanks Lucien Nunes! Yes, you are right, by this setup I have the problem that some of the male connections (with free and open contacts) will be exposed.

Simply because I am using a Male to Male "Bridge" to connection one box to another. It always seems like it is a trade-off between modularity and the possibility to wire up the boxes.

Does anyone have a smart solution for that, without sacrifizing the option to connect any box by all four corners?
 
How often are you going to be moving these 'blocks' around?
 
If you want up to four possible input positions on each box, one system would be to wire up as you have at the moment, but use the existing female Wago ports only as outlets. Fit a snap-in male inlet at each corner but wire all four separately to a selector switch, from which the output feeds into the existing wiring. There are strict technical requirements for the type of switches that may be used, to avoid the unused inlets becoming live in the event of switch malfunction. The switch would likely be fairly expensive. The input selection could be made automatic using relays, again with technical requirements to prevent unused inlets becomeing live.

You could avoid the selector switch by an alternative scheme of wiring, with a disadvantage of many extra connectors in a chain and with them the increased risk of the safety earth connection being broken somewhere along the chain. The idea would be to wire each corner of each box as a separate, identical unit with parallel-connected male snap-in inlet, female snap-in outlet, appliance outlets and a cable to the next corner where it terminates in a cable-mounted female. Normally, the cable-females would be plugged into the snap-in males, to make a complete ring. To power the box, the female cable connector would be disconnected from the snap-in inlet and the supply cable attached instead, from which all corners of the box are then powered by the (now broken) ring. The jumper cable to the next box can be taken from any corner as all snap-in females are now powered.

I think the number of connectors in this confguration is a genuine concern and would not really recommend it. With four boxes plugged in the least favourable layout, there could be 19 pluggable connectors between the main supply cable and the last appliance outlet.
 
Red box is one wago snap in. Then. It will all go bang. You need three wago all separate. one for each live/Neutral/CPC. I see you need an electrician to do it correctly.

Good luck
 

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