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[Jared Koopman]

Hi.

I have two 50ft 12/4 cables with quad edison boxes on one end. The other end is bare, can I safely put an edison plug on the end and use like that or do I have to use the 4 prong 20 amp plug?

Most of my setups use edison so I would prefer that if possible. I know I will lose the 2 circuits of the cable but honestly I don't care at this point, I just need it functional and safe.

Thanks
Jared

[Mike Sokol]

Hi.

I have two 50ft 12/4 cables with quad edison boxes on one end. The other end is bare, can I safely put an edison plug on the end and use like that or do I have to use the 4 prong 20 amp plug?

Most of my setups use edison so I would prefer that if possible. I know I will lose the 2 circuits of the cable but honestly I don't care at this point, I just need it functional and safe.

Thanks
Jared

I would consider installing the proper twist-lock plugs on your cables (L 14-20?), then adding a NEMA 5-15 adapter for plugging into Edison outlets. That way you reduce your voltage drop by 33% (I think) over the run since you're using both legs of the extension cable, but with a common neutral. And then you can always use your quad boxes to plug into a 4-wire distro if you're in that situation.

See http://www.customavrack.com/products/988-5-15p-plug-adapters.aspx for every kind of adapter possible.

What do you wire monkeys think. Is this a reasonable solution? That's how I would do it and it appears to follow all code and UL requirements I can think of.
 

[TJ (Tom) Cornish]

Hi.

I have two 50ft 12/4 cables with quad edison boxes on one end. The other end is bare, can I safely put an edison plug on the end and use like that or do I have to use the 4 prong 20 amp plug?

Most of my setups use edison so I would prefer that if possible. I know I will lose the 2 circuits of the cable but honestly I don't care at this point, I just need it functional and safe.

Thanks
Jared

I would ignore the red wire and get 'er done.

[Stephen Swaffer]

If you ignore the red wire, you still need to rewire the quad-or only us it as a duplex.

Mike' suggestion is more flexible.

If you don't need flexibility, do as TJ suggests-but rewire the quad.  It might be tempting to just hook both red and black wires to the same terminal-might even be doable, but almost certainly wouldn't meet UL specs for the plug.

[Kemper Watson]

Hi.

I have two 50ft 12/4 cables with quad edison boxes on one end. The other end is bare, can I safely put an edison plug on the end and use like that or do I have to use the 4 prong 20 amp plug?

Most of my setups use edison so I would prefer that if possible. I know I will lose the 2 circuits of the cable but honestly I don't care at this point, I just need it functional and safe.

Thanks
Jared

How is the quad box wired? Sounds like it might have been a cheater tail, wired to a 4 wire dryer plug, or a L14-30.

[Spenser Hamilton]

Hi.

I have two 50ft 12/4 cables with quad edison boxes on one end. The other end is bare, can I safely put an edison plug on the end and use like that or do I have to use the 4 prong 20 amp plug?

Most of my setups use edison so I would prefer that if possible. I know I will lose the 2 circuits of the cable but honestly I don't care at this point, I just need it functional and safe.

Thanks
Jared

As far as I can see there is two options.

A) terminate with L14-20.
B) remove and recycle the 12/4 for another use, replace with 12/3, terminate with u-ground.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[TJ (Tom) Cornish]

As far as I can see there is two options.

A) terminate with L14-20.
B) remove and recycle the 12/4 for another use, replace with 12/3, terminate with u-ground.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Why replace the 12/4?

[Tim McCulloch]

As far as I can see there is two options.

A) terminate with L14-20.
B) remove and recycle the 12/4 for another use, replace with 12/3, terminate with u-ground.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Put an Edison on the cord, using the green, white and black wires.  Re-wire the quad box so all outlets are fed from these conductors.  Enjoy a nice cup of coffee.

[Jared Koopman]

Put an Edison on the cord, using the green, white and black wires.  Re-wire the quad box so all outlets are fed from these conductors.  Enjoy a nice cup of coffee.

That is my plan. For now it will be fine. Once we start doing more with 3 phase I will switch it back over.

[Tim McCulloch]

That is my plan. For now it will be fine. Once we start doing more with 3 phase I will switch it back over.

You need 5 conductors for 3 phase.

To re-purpose this assembly later, you could use 2 hot legs from 3 phase, use a 20 amp 2 pole breaker, L14-20 connectors and re-wire the quad box so each duplex is supplied by 1 phase leg.  There are other implications that are sure to be posited, but low current applications (like back line) won't impose a significant contribution to neutral current.

[ProSoundWeb Community]