Hewlett-Packard is recalling about 6 million computer power cords after 29 reports of the cords melting or charring, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said Tuesday. The recalled item, the LS-15 AC power cord, was distributed with Hewlett-Packard and Compaq notebook and mini notebook computers and with AC adapter-powered accessories such as docking stations, the commission said in a statement.
The affected AC power cords were shipped with products and accessories sold from September 2010 through June 2012.
It is not clear where the problem with the cords lies. Were the cords not made to specifications? Or, were they made to spec, but they were not specified correctly. A quick search on the net failed to turn up the root cause.
Though cords, wires, and cables seem so mundane, problems do arise when they are not up to the task. What problems have you encountered due to wiring issues?
(Score: 3, Informative) by danomac on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:29PM
Someone I know who isn't tech-savvy called me in a panic and I went over to look. Her laptop had the typical brick, and the recall involved certain power cords that ran from the brick to the wall. The laptop I checked did not have the right marking (LS-15) so that laptop wasn't affected. This laptop power cord fit very snugly in the power brick, I had to pull quite hard to get it to release. Perhaps the LS-15 cords don't fit snugly or there's a bad connection - bam - fire.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:32PM
HP done made shit pow cords, brotha! Six mil shit pow cords! Now yo chance to sue whitey! Sue im fo all ee gots! Dats rite, whitey tried to kill yo wit shit pow cords! Dis injustize will not stand, brothas! Black power cord power in the da house!!!
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:26AM
It's a good thing you are anonymous, or you'd be booed out of the community for that.
I don't even know how your joke really even fits, honestly. It's just, off topic troll.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:49AM
Is on topic troll, you dumb fuck. If you insist on making a smartass reply, you could point out that a lawsuit against HP after a voluntary recall would be frivolous unless the plaintiff can show damages OR the plaintiff is BLACK and the case is heard by an ALL BLACK JURY, nigga!
(Score: 1) by PlasticCogLiquid on Sunday August 31 2014, @11:15AM
Yeah! Ferguson power!
(Score: 1, Troll) by zafiro17 on Sunday August 31 2014, @11:09PM
You are feeding the troll. Ignore them and they'll go elsewhere.
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Subsentient on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:29AM
I was replacing a broken socket once, and moron me thought "I'll just get some random socket from the discount bin!"
Bad idea. My more hardware-inclined bud from up North happened to be here and he noticed that we had aluminum house wiring, and that the socket type I was going to install was a rather high fire risk due to the expansion/contraction etc of the two metals. That could have been ugly. I had to fork out more cash for a much more expensive socket that was compatible with our rather uncommon house wiring. I swear, I can't use the ceiling fan without smelling burning electronics, so I don't use it. Maybe I would still have been better than the lobotomized baboon who wired this place.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 5, Informative) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:53AM
This may not be considered a wiring problem in the "cord" sense, but it is most definitely related:
My female friend complained about having problems with her laptop charging, saying that the charger got too hot and the battery never got fully-charged. After determining that her charger was good, I suspected that something in the laptop jack was shorting and so I disassembled her laptop and removed the EMI shield from the jack. It took me a really close look, but I found the culprit -- tin whiskers. [nbcnews.com]
"Goddammit," I said, because had that assembly not been lead-free, the whiskers which were shorting the tip to ground wouldn't have been there. This is one of the great hustles of lead-free electronics -- The idea is that lead-free electronics are more environmentally friendly when junked, but the truth is that they create a lot more (environmentally-friendly) trash because of their lower reliability. Lead-free solder joints tend to be brittle, they crack, the joints are dull and cold-looking, they require higher temperatures, and of course they form tin whiskers which cause all kinds of head-scratching internal shorting problems -- ask Microsoft about their red ring of death problem -- that would not have happened has they used lead solder in the X-Box's contruction.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:58AM
Tell me more. Do you have enough material for a romance novel? I smell a book deal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:07AM
The closest thing I have is that we were having sex on a secluded area of the beach, and while we were intimate I looked up to the rock above and saw some weirdo recording us with his camera. We had to stop since my female friend is in a high and unique position, professionally, and so avoids recording her face and most of her body.
Apparently a lot of weirdos with cameras (not phone cameras either, they bring camcorders and other professional cameras) hang out at place because it's a popular trysting spot -- even if my female friend did get sand in her crack. You can go to that spot at dusk or nighttime and actually see against the seawall a line of dudes with cameras around their necks lying in wait. For those of you who are familiar with San Diego, that spot is somewhere between Ocean Beach and Sunset Cliffs.
(Score: 2, Informative) by PlasticCogLiquid on Sunday August 31 2014, @11:32AM
Totally true Ethanol, I good portion of my business goes to re-flowing just about every type of modern electronics. Makes me money but it also pisses me off beyond belief because I find myself taking my own systems/consoles to work for a fucking reflow.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @04:08PM
My female friend complained about having problems with her laptop charging, saying that the charger got too hot and the battery never got fully-charged. After determining that her charger was good, I suspected that something in the laptop jack was shorting and so I disassembled her laptop and removed the EMI shield from the jack. It took me a really close look, but I found the culprit -- tin whiskers.
That's not credible answer. Tin whiskers short out at 10mA and charging port has much much higher current.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday September 01 2014, @01:58AM
Well, I don't know how to reply to that, you could be correct.
What happened was that I saw tin whiskers in the area, cleaned the hell out of it (and gave a quick rundown of parts of the motherboard) with brushes and flux-off, and when I reassembled the thing the problem was gone. It might have not been directly off the supply voltage, but in another part of the circuit, who knows. That's what I figured.
(Score: 4, Informative) by anubi on Sunday August 31 2014, @03:33AM
Now that you mention aluminum wiring, I will comment to say I have been encountering aluminum electrical cords in the low-cost electronics arena lately.
These look just like the copper wires we have long used, however I discovered it when I was trying to build a patch cable to power Arduino systems with a USB cord I got from the dollar store. I cut one end off, stripped it, and proceeded to try to solder it to wirewrap pin connectors ( aka DuPont connector ).. The attempt was unsuccessful. The wire, although it looked like copper, would not "wet".
Turns out the copper appearance was due to some technology someone is using to copper-plate aluminum wire. When I attempted to solder to it, the solder quickly dissolved off the plating. ( History note: it would also dissolve the silver plating on those old Tektronix oscilloscope terminal strips they had in their old 545 series vacuum-tube oscilloscopes. Tektronix even provided a coil of silver loaded solder for this purpose, neatly placed inside the oscilloscope, and warned you to use it instead of regular solder, as they well knew the leaching effect plain old tin-lead solder would have on the silver-plated ceramic terminal strips they were using ).
The idea of using copper-plated aluminum wire was working for the cheap USB cables, as their connectors were crimped, not soldered. I solved my little problem by using crimping instead of soldering to this kind of wire.
So, if any of you pick up some odd wire that looks just like the old copper wire you have used for years, but it won't wet like it ought to, regardless of how much flux you used, look at your wire carefully. It may well be aluminum wire plated with copper.
I have also seen rolls of what looked like heavy current speaker wire made in this manner. It looks like heavy copper lamp cord with with transparent insulation. It was made to look really neat on the store shelf. Electrically, it was not as good as plain old copper lamp cord. I discovered that when I tried to make some high current battery cabling with it. Just wanted to warn you guys this stuff is out there on the store shelves and verify a piece of it before you spend the bucks for a roll of it.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Magic Oddball on Sunday August 31 2014, @09:30AM
I hope that it doesn't cause the kind of eventual fire hazards [wikipedia.org] that mixing aluminum and copper electrical wiring has in many US houses built in the late 60s/early 70s like mine.
(Score: 2, Informative) by anubi on Sunday August 31 2014, @10:53AM
That is why I could not use it for the batteries. Too much current. It looked like a spool of heavy copper wire. It fooled me. It turned out to be the most expensive roll of baling wire I ever bought. Didn't make good baling wire either. Too weak.
After seeing speaker wiring, USB cables, and 2.5mm power plugs made using this copper plated aluminum wire, it would not surprise me to see it show up in other places. I have also noted a lot of copper and tin plated steel wire showing up as well - its attraction to a magnet is a dead giveaway.
Oh well... live and learn.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Sunday August 31 2014, @11:46AM
"I have also noted a lot of copper... plated steel wire showing up as well - its attraction to a magnet is a dead giveaway"
That stuff is awesome BTW for ham radio antennas and is not necessarily cheaper than pure copper (if made properly out of good cabling steel, which the Chinese stuff probably isnt)
It doesn't stretch (as much) and you can use smaller diameter, lighter, wire. So lower wind forces, lighter cheaper constructed supports, lighter cheaper insulators, its just all around awesome for ham radio antennas.
A corroded copperclad antenna doesn't work all that much worse than a corroded copper antenna so its not much of a loss in that respect.
I just thought you might find it amusing that for a certain class of jobs, people pay a lot of money for that product.
As far as I know noone is selling kevlar reinforced copper wire for antennas. Kevlar reinforcement is popular for aerial optical fiber and it would be a step above the copperclad.
The main problem with the copperclad is kinks or tangles will damage the plating. Just gotta use it correctly, thats all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @04:16PM
Never ever buy a house with shit aluminum wires. You'll end up rewiring everything, or your house will burn down mysteriously.
Mold (eg. check basement behind some furniture in the corners of the room), wrong wire types, leaky roof, poor insulation, bad windows. Just some of the things to look for before buying. Esthetics like "this room looks nice!", are all secondary. Paint is cheap.
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:14AM
I had a 486SX laptop which contained a 4-cell nicad battery pack. The cord from the power supply brick to the laptop was very stiff and heavy, and ended with a mini-DIN connector, of all things. After a while the plug and the solder joints on the PCB loosened up, connections became intermittant and the battery wouldn't charge sometimes. Then one time the battery got so hot that the plastic case (including the laptop itself) started to melt.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday August 31 2014, @11:51AM
"A quick search on the net failed to turn up the root cause."
I was part of a recall for power cords about 15 years ago where the Chinese swapped the hot and neutral in the cable. Most stuff simply doesn't care although technically its "wrong" and is slightly less safe.
I think they used similar non technical wording about fire risks and stuff. Its kind of like how anything big brother doesn't like is terrorism, or any form of abuse is protecting us from terrorism. They just use "fire risk" as their root password sorta.
The only other ways I can think of to fail are bad plastic leading to eventual corrosion or bad metal leading to crimps loosening or connections getting weak.