Tony Duell wrote:
<snip>
I'ev come across it on other HP stuff. My older HP9100B has one (my later
9100B has a normal IEC 'kettle plug'). My 5243 and 5245 counters have
them. I think my Intellec MCS8i had one, but I cbanged that to an IEC plug.
I suspect it was a common connecotr at one time. Which means somebody may
still be making them.
-tony
There is also a supply of the cords here:
http://www.sphere.bc.ca/test/cables.html
http://www.electronicsurplus.com/dictionary/cat1969.htm
Anyway, both these connectors and others were in common use, and were
changed when the electrical code was revised to lower the acceptable
amount of current that could be supplied thru various means.
At Microdata we had a 30 amp cabinet power connector which was made by
Hubble to EIA (i think) standards. That amount of current was banned
and the current to any bay was reduced to 20 amps. We therefore had to
go to a different bay design with less equipment, and the newer twist
lock connector. The bay height was reduced by about 12 to reflect this.
The change I refer to above was made when the new style clipped
rectangular power cords were first introduced, and the oval ones we are
discussing were replaced in equipment designs. Also discontinued was
the practices of integrated cords, because as we all know now, the fixed
cords fray and present a fire hazard at the place the cord penetrates
the equipment housing.
I wish someone had a page with information on the UL and other standards
proceedings, as I think that this would be where the connectors an
standards history would be located, but I could not find anything with a
bit of searching.
Also, Tony, I looked for a UK supplier of these cords without success.
I realized that you call the power plugs the "mains" and searched with
that term, and also used UK and British, and Great Britain in the search
term w/o much success. For some reason several searches came up with
patents and nuclear power plant topics as matches, but no power cord
suppliers.
Jim