Taking Apart Switch Sockets to Determine Value

1.Appearance

As highly frequently used items in the home, switches and sockets, on the one hand, affect the taste (appearance) of the decoration, and on the other hand, determine

In terms of user experience (performance), more importantly, it is related to the safety of family members. Therefore, you must not be careless when choosing switches and sockets. Today I’m going to disassemble the J&S LIGHTING ‘Vision Pro’ series I bought recently and look at the interior doors.

Discuss what type of switches and sockets you should buy.

The most important thing to consider when choosing a switch or socket is whether it looks good. &S LIGHTING’s “Vision Pro” series is different from traditional panels with wide borders in the past, and is also different from the popular frameless panels. It has a unique, asymmetrical design for the upper and lower border;

The curvature is beautiful, in line with the rigorous and refined German design;

The fluorescent strips do not occupy the same side of the panel as the logo. This is the first time I have seen this layout. It is a small design ingenuity and the panel integrity is better. The fluorescent strips can be seen in the image below. of.

It is not only stylish, but also practical, as you won’t be fumbling around in the dark.

In terms of color, in addition to the common standard colors such as black, white, gray and gold, it also provides 4 customized Morandi colors, which can match various decoration styles. I have to say that the 4 customized colors are really good-looking.

02.carrier fluid

That is, the place where the plug comes into contact every time it is plugged and unplugg-ed, also call-ed the shrapnel. Elastic is the main structure of the conductor internal part.

The quality of the tablet directly affects the user experience and lifespan, and its importance is self-evident.

The spring piece is a very important part of a good socket. It has high demands on the spring piece, including excellent conductivity. inferior

After using a high-quality socket for a period of time, you will find that it becomes looser and looser. This means that the shrapnel has lost its toughness, and a good socket will become looser and looser.

I’m afraid it will still be tight after several years of use.

Commonly used materials for current-carrying parts include brass, red copper, tin-phosphorus bronze, and copper plating. Currently, the better ones are tin-phosphorus bronze.

There may be better materials, I am just talking about the common ones on the market.

The rose gold-colored metal sheet in the picture below is the current-carrying part. The entire metal sheet is not carrie-d in separate parts. It is a whole piece, which is the “rivet-free one-piece manufacturing process” marked by the manufacturer, and has better toughness and strength

The weight of the copper components also shows the quality of the product. The materials are more likely to be piled up in good sockets.

Knowledge point: Which material is best for shrapnel?

Alloys containing copper: Copper-zinc (brass), Tin-phosphorus alloy

Before the advent of composite materials, pure copper was indeed the best conductive material, and the performance of copper materials also varied. It depends on the purity of the copper. The purer the copper, the better the conductivity. Brass is better, and red copper is better than brass. However, copper has its inherent flaws. First, it is softer. Second, its toughness is low. Its resistance isn’t very good. In addition, it is easy to oxidize and rust.
These properties of tin-phosphorus bronze are better than those of pure copper. Most obvious are the improvements in oxidation resistance, hardness and toughness. Shrapnel made from tin-phosphorus can be inserted and removed more than 50,000 time. .

When purchasing, you should pay attention to the details. Generally, most of the tin-phosphorus alloys will be promot-ed as selling points.

The life expectancy of household appliances can be affected by plugging them into an unsafe switch socket. In the worst case, they may cause fires. Attention is needed to this hidden danger.

Material, fixed frame

Regarding switch and socket materials, currently the most common ones are PC materials for frames, buttons and fixing frames, PC materials for high-end rear seats, ABS materials for ordinary ones, and nylon 66 for poor ones. It is very easy to distinguish. Just look at the color of the back seat intuitively. White is the most common. The black one depends on the situation. It looks very smooth. If it smells odorless, it may be PC. The surface looks rough or simply made. If it’s matte, it’s probably ABS. If it smells like plastic, then it is probably nylon 66.

Conclusion: PC>ABS>Nylon 66

The PCs can also be divided into three, six, or nine levels. The imported PC material, also known as German Bayer, will be used in the high-end series.

Many manufacturers will say that my switch is from Germany’s Bayer, but there are not many PC materials that actually have import certificates.

PCs are the best except for Bayer in Germany. , followed by PCs produced in Taiwan, and more domestic PCs.

They are already conscious products, and even more so, if they use only pure PCs. Is this possible? There are almost no manufacturers.

Fixtures are generally divid-ed into steel and PC, both of which have their own advantages and disadvantages.

1Steel

Steel bracket products have good installation strength, but have high requirements for the wall. The wiring requirements are high and there is no loose pressure line. And the production cost is also lower than PC.

2PC

The PC lining board is tough, requires little installation on the wall and does not suffer from off-line conductivity. Good PC is more expensive and has better electrical performance than steel.

The “Vision Pro” panel is ma-de of German Bayer polycarbonate + the fixing frame is made of German Bayer PC material.

It can be said that a lot of money has been spen-t, and the touch and performance are excellent.

04.Pressing method

There are more screws for crimping wires. It is possible to connect thicker wires without the need for thread-picking.

Many strands can be connect-ed at one time, which is suitable for work equipment. The disadvantage is that the screw tips are easy to damage the wires, and it is also easy for the wires to slip and not tighten the wires. Affects secondary wiring.

Nowadays, many manufacturers have improved screws. They use flat-head or round-head screws and a pressure plate to press the wire. Two strands are connected at the same. Pressure plate is used to top-off the wire. This increases the stress area, and it is difficult to damage the cable. The wire diameter is a disadvantage. It can’t be too thick, otherwise it won’t fit in. This type of wire is fine for home decor, but is much more difficult to use for industrial equipment that often has multiple thick wires.

Quick wiring is fast. You can tell that quick wiring is fast by its name. The wires will automatically get stuck when insert-ed without twisting the screws. The disadvantage is that the wires cannot be reuse-d. You must plug them in correctly the first time, otherwise they cannot be tak-en off and re-plugged.

The saddle-type terminal used by “Vision Pro” is more scientific, combining the advantages of screw crimping and pressure plate crimping.

05.protective door

A socket with a protective cover has “unilateral locking” functionality. Accidental electric shocks will not happen as long as you do not insert the same force into two or three holes at the same time. This type of protective door is effective in protecting children. This component is now found in all sockets. When we are choosing, we can also find an iron piece to try to see if there is a baffle in the socket, and whether the two holes must be insert-ed together to insert it. If they are both the same, the socket will have a protective cover. .-

Switch contact

The contact is what matters most for a switch. The contacts produce a sound when we press the switch. This is caused by the two metal balls or pieces. Contacts that are too unsafe can cause arcing, which could lead to a switch short-circuiting and causing danger. Silver-cadmium contacts are used in high-quality switches. They can suppress arcs and function as instantaneous overloads. Poor quality switches are made with copper sheets or contacts that have been silver-plated. These inferior switches cut corners and present a high level of safety risk.

For “Vision Pro”, the switch design has the following highlights.

01.V-shaped groove patented structure

The V-shaped groove patent structure suppresses arcs, eliminates excess carbon deposits, and reduces product carbon deposits. The product life can reach more than 40,000 times.

Silver contacts can be enlarged and thickened

The silver-coated layer has a thickness of >0.35mm in the middle, which improves current carrying capacity and impact resistance.

Ball-to-ball upper- and lower-silver contact mechanism

The thickness of the silver contact alloy layer is thick in the center and thins sharply toward the edges. Ball-to-ball contacts ensure that the current impact always occurs in the thickest portion of the center. This reduces the impact of manufacturing mistakes and pivot wear.

04.The electric bridge and the pivot shaft are made of red copper, and the surface of the electric bridge is plated with silver.

7.others

A qualified product series of a brand needs to have complete product models, so that it can meet the different needs of each family and ensure the uniformity of switches and sockets in the home. It is not easy to have two different types of sockets or switches.

This is another very important indicator. The distance between the plugs can be too close and cause them to “fight”, lowering the socket’s usage rate. The “Vision Pro”, five-hole socket, adopts a design with a large space.

Two plugs can be connected simultaneously because the distance is a little larger than in other sockets.

When purchasing a switch, you should also pay attention to the choice of single control/dual control.

Single control switch: If you only need to use one switch to control a light in one place, then you can use a single control switch for this switch.

Double control switch socket: You need this if you want to be able to control the light in both places.

In my house, for example, I installed a dual-control light switch at the entrance to the master bedroom as well as at the foot of the bed. This allows me to control the lights in the bedroom from both locations. Switch on the light through switch 1, when you enter the bedroom. Turn off the light through switch 2, when you go to sleep, to avoid having to get down to the floor. I designed dual-control switches for the stairs of the first and second floor. If this function was not considered during the hard installation, it can now be realized through subsequent home decoration smart sockets.

Another point of purchase that is often overlooked is the thickness of the back seat, especially if there are multiple wires in the bottom box. If the back seat is too thick, installation problems may occur. The base of the Vision Pro is slimmer on the right, as you can see in the image below. This allows for more installation options.

8.Shopping tips

Certification to 01.3C is essential

The key points for purchasing sockets have been mentioned in the previous part. Before deciding to buy, you can buy a five-hole socket of each alternative and take it apart to compare.

A very important reminder is here! A 3C certification mark is required! ! ! Switches and sockets are electrical devices that involve personal safety. If you don’t even have 3C certification, how can I believe that you are not selling goods from a small workshop? Who can guarantee the safety during use?

The previous disassembly I did was just an analysis of the materials and structural design. Professional equipment is needed to test for electrical safety and durability. 3C is a basic guarantee.

Buy products from large brands and factories

The technical threshold for switches and sockets is not high, and small workshops can also make them. Small factories also have lower costs for opening molds, more flexibility in production and less supervision. They can create personalized products more quickly, according to the market’s demand. Most major manufacturers won’t do it.

The introduction of this kind ofswitch socket is usually about how beautiful it is, but the performance of the product is simply mentioned or not mentioned at all. It is for this reason that I always recommend purchasing brand name products from major manufacturers. As mentioned above, major manufacturers are the only ones who will enforce durability and electrical safety and spend a great deal of money and resources on related equipment.

The quality of mass-produced switches and sockets is high, because if a defective switch socket is used, it can cause malfunctions or even threaten property and personal safety. Apart from anything else, I don’t believe that small workshops will purchase equipment to conduct socket durability tests and salt spray tests.

So which brands are considered reliable brands? This is not a complete list.

03.Watch out for fakes

Profiteers are attracted to profiteers wherever there are people. Switch and sockets are no exception. It is one of the products most affected by counterfeit goods. Take J&S LIGHTING, which is very popular in the market, as an example.

As non-practitioners we are unable to identify a lot of these high imitation products, from their packaging or serial numbers. Spending money is fine, but the most important thing is to be concerned about safety.

First, I suggest that you choose an authorized or official store and then check each anti-counterfeiting code. (Mixed sales are also possible from time to time). Don’t be greedy for small gains and suffer big losses.

9.Summarize

Switches and sockets are electrical components. You must be careful when buying them. Safety comes first.

It is important to consider both the appearance and performance of the product. As ordinary consumers, after all, we don’t have that much professional equipment to test one by one, so purchasing products from big brands through formal channels is the most worry-free option.

In this article, we will use the &S Lighting “Vision Pro” Series. It is reliable when it comes to appearance, brand and performance.

Rich model types and colors are eye-catching.