Another heat tape wiring question...

His original diagram shows a series circuit as well if you follow the path of electricity. The math also supports this. His diagram matches my college text book only the text book uses light bulbs as the load.

Forgive if I am wrong MarkS but your first diagram also shows parallel wiring. The load happens across each panel the bus bars offer no more resistance than wires.

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Originally Posted by whispersinmyhead

His original diagram shows a series circuit as well if you follow the path of electricity. The math also supports this. His diagram matches my college text book only the text book uses light bulbs as the load.

Forgive if I am wrong MarkS but your first diagram also shows parallel wiring. The load happens across each panel the bus bars offer no more resistance than wires.

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You're probably right, I don't have any kind of electrical background, I'm just repeating what I've been told (in which case I've been wrong for 20 years. LOL) How would you do the math on both of my examples assuming regular household AC and 4 foot lengths of 4" flexwatt tape at 8 Watts per foot?

Your example that is supposed to be a series circuit is actually a parallel circuit. There should be no voltage drop after each load in both examples. Voltage should be 120V at each load. Current will be .2666A.

If you had these in series like the OP had and you had 4 pieces of heat tape each load should have a voltage drop of 30v.

Please note I am a little rusty as it has been 10 years since circuits classes :)

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Originally Posted by Zuma22

This thread is great, but what tools/parts are you using to wire these strips in parallel?? What I really need to know is: how can I do it without soldering?? Went to RadioShack and got wire and connectors, but then the guy told me that the connectors I had wouldn't support 120V and he didn't know what would. I'm hoping to either do this by crimping or riveting, but I'm hoping you guys can tell me exactly what parts and pieces you used to do this.

I already have one end wired with the plug, and was just planning on running a continuous strip, but I would now prefer to cut into strips so I'm not wasting any heat. THANK YOU!!

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This is the method i used http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsPkIiDZdO0. Except instead of a hole punch I just drilled a hole & then used a small screw & screwed terminals right down to the shelf. then I used the liquid electrical tape On all exposed metal.

I liked this method much better than melting the outer plastic layer off the heat tape. once you separate the layers the copper is completely exposed for a good connection.

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Originally Posted by jedidiah578

This is the method i used http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsPkIiDZdO0. Except instead of a hole punch I just drilled a hole & then used a small screw & screwed terminals right down to the shelf. then I used the liquid electrical tape On all exposed metal.

I liked this method much better than melting the outer plastic layer off the heat tape. once you separate the layers the copper is completely exposed for a good connection.

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I like the THG heat tape and I want to try the new connectors. One thing that I saw in the video that I think is a big no no is telling people that they don't need anything to hold the connections in that is really asking for trouble.

I know myself what you are saying just screwing the connections right into the wood I would never do that. Just think what would happen if you spilled water on it. That's number one. Number 2 wood absorbs water really easy and that could be very bad too once the water gets into it. That's just me though.