The 20 Amp Extension Cord Mystery

Posted on by Jeff Posted in extension cords — No Comments ↓

We have a great line of extension cords intended for heavy duty use.  They use 12 gauge cable which gives them a 20 amp capacity, but we can’t really call them 20 amp cables because of the connectors that we use.

This has led to more than a little confusion among our customers.

Here’s why.

If you are familiar with standard wall outlets, you are probably aware that there are two different versions of outlets that look almost identical.

The standard 15 amp duplex receptacle (wall outlet) has openings for two parallel blades and a semi-circular ground prong.  This has been standard for almost 50 years.

duplex.jpeg

An almost identical version of this outlet has an additional slot set at a right angle as part of the parallel blade opening on one side.

duplex_20_amp.jpeg

If the outlet has this additional right angle slot, it is intended not just 15 amp service, but 20 amp service as well.

A true 20 amp connector (male) on an extension cord will have, not two parallel blades, but rather two blades set at right angles to each other.  Otherwise they are identical.  Same size connector body, same size blades, same everything else.

15 Amp(Nema 5-15)15_amp.jpeg

20 Amp (Nema 5-20) 20_amp.jpeg

If we sold our “20 amp” extension cords with a  20 amp rated connector, they it would only plug into the version of the wall outlet that is designed to accomodate both types of blades.

20 Amp Wall Outlet(Nema 5-20)20_amp_outlet.jpeg

While we are confident that the product we sell is designed to handle a true 20 amp load, in order to truly rate an extension cord as being “20 amps” it must have one of its connector blades at right angles to the other.

Want to know more?  Here’s a valuable Wikipedia article.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape,Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords andOnStage Stand mic stands.   Click here to sign up for our newsletter.  Lots more good ideas at our Twitter feed.

A Tip Of The Hat To Duracell

Posted on by Jeff Posted in batteries, branding, customer service, good business ideas — No Comments ↓

mic stand mic for buybattery.comDuracell, in cooperation with the Firehouse Subs restaurant chain have a national Fire Safety month promotion that will reward customers who buy a $5  medallion at the restaurant with a free Duracell 9 volt battery.

October is national fire safety month, a time when everyone is reminded to change the batteries in their smoke detectors.

Purchasing a Firehouse Subs medallion funds a program called the Firehouse Public Safety Foundation which has donated over $3 million in life saving equipment to public safety agencies.

Duracell is providing 27, 180 9 volts in support of the program.

Don’t forget to change your smoke detector battery this month.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

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Really Friendly Robots

Posted on by Jeff Posted in good business ideas, Other News, volleyball tape, web development — No Comments ↓

spokesperson for goodbuyguys.comWe manage content for lots of blogs, primarily sites that are product specific.  They are all built on the Word Press platform.

By default, settings for Word Press allow readers to post comments.  You can moderate the comments and decide whether you want to allow readers to see them or just delete.

There is a strategy among people who optimize sites for search whereby they post comments to blog sites and if the site allows the posting to be displayed, then it creates what is called a “backlink” (a link back to the poster’s own site) which, at least in theory, improves that’s sites performance with major search engines.

Most of the comments we get appear to be automated,  posted by robots, and probably from programmers whose native language is not english.

Here are a few recent comments:

When he recovers he doesnt give up and his next confrontation goes somewhat improved.

Good post. I be taught something more difficult on totally different blogs everyday.

We can’t give your site earlier than telling you that many of us seriously loved the coffee quality information you are offering on your visitors?

I experience fairly fortunate to have encounter your internet webpage

Digged google 30 mins, findally i get it, thanks!

Perhaps my favorite of all time:

These are impressive articles. Keep up the sunny handiwork.

Here’s where you can view our other blogs:

Allabouttape.com

Tapenews.com

Volleyballtape.com

Routesettingtape.com

Hooptape.com

Thetapeworksblog.com

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

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“As Seen On The Radio”

Posted on by Jeff Posted in duct tape, flashlights — No Comments ↓

Tex TalksI wrote a while back on the subject of how people who produce video in front of live audiences are blind to anything that the camera does not see, regardless of what the audience in the hall might be viewing. Well, it certainly seems like they are ahead of folks who do radio shows in front of live audiences. It appears that they see nothing at all!

I have been watching a lot of digital tv and I stumbled upon a telecast of a live radio show produced weekly by the company that broadcasts basketball games at the University of North Carolina, my alma mater. Apparently I was the only person who realized that people might be watching as well as listening.

This show is broadcast from a local restaurant and is done for a live and broadcast audience. The set consisted of the coach and the host sitting at a table with a banner slapped on it with duct tape ( wrinkles and all) and it looked like it had been lit with a couple of maglites. About half the time the single static camera shot was blocked by people walking back and forth in front of the camera, probably on their way to the bar.

Its difficult to understand how an organization that should be as media savy as an NCAA Division 1 athletic department could allow a presentation like this to be seen by anyone. It wasn’t good enough for YouTube!

The proliferation of digital television channels is going to mean that more and more program material that was intended to be heard but not seen is going to be broadcast. I’m not advocating that the bar for production values be set very high, but it’s got to be set higher than this.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords, and lots of other great products for the video production industry.

Are You Sure They’re Really Musicians?

Posted on by Jeff Posted in Pro lighting, Pro Sound, Staging — No Comments ↓

Like many of you, I migrated from performing to being a stage tech at least partly because I realized that most musicians could barely find their way to the gig, and thus there were real opportunities in migrating from playing to producing.  It is a decision I never regretted.  In the process, it became easier and easier to dismiss the real concerns of performers when they strayed beyond the discussion of their art.

I had written several articles about stage collapses this summer and had been one of many in the production community who called for a re-examination of the standards applied to temporary stage structures.

I only realized recently that one very important part of the impacted community had not really spoken up.  This was because Cheap Trick guitarist and manager Dave Frey visited Congress to lobby for increased regulations on temporary stages.

As you may remember, Cheap Trick was set to perform on the stage that collapsed at the Ottowa Blues Fest on July 17.  Obvioiusly, these two have a unique experience in this area and speak with a voice that needs to be heard.

Nothing would bring about changes in this critical area more quickly than to have performers refuse to play in structures that did not meet strict codes and undergo thorough inspection.

A contract that specifies “no brown M&M’s” in the dressing room but says nothing about the safety of the stage is over due to be re-written.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

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Making The Case For An XLR Speaker Cable

Posted on by Jeff Posted in mic cables — No Comments ↓

Many years ago when I worked in the Technical Services Dept. at Duke University, we embraced a speaker cable connector standard that seems to have fallen by the wayside.  We used the standard XLR3 connector for speaker cables-the same connector that was used on microphone cables.

xlr_3.jpg

With my background in pro sound, I was familiar with both the quarter inch standard quarter.jpg, and the Canon EP  neutrik.jpeg multipin standard. I had never seen the XLR used for speaker cables.  I quickly became a convert. Here’s why.

Because speaker cables with XLR connectors have a male connector on one end and a female on the other, its easy to extend the length of a cable without an adapter.  Not using an adapter means not losing an adapter.  This is a really valuable feature when doing long outdoor speaker cable runs.

Each pin in an XLR3 connector is rated at 15 amps.   That’s more than enough current carrying capacity for most practical amplifier outputs.

The flexible strain relief boot on an XLR connector is flexible enough to handle 2 conductor 14 gauge, or even 12 gauge cable.

Each pin makes independent contact with the mating connector, unlike a quarter inch connector where the tip must make contact with the sleeve before it mates with the tip.

Finally the solid, easy to use locking mechanism on the XLR3 means that no additional securing of a connection is necessary when cables are linked together.

A couple of amplifier manufacturers adopted this standard back in the 1980’s, but they let it fall by the wayside when the industry as a whole failed to sign up.

On more than one occasion, I must admit that I used a microphone cable as a temporary speaker cable when I ran out of speaker cables.  Try that with a Speakon cable!

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords , OnStage Stand mic stands and quality speaker cables.

Now That’s Some Cool Tape

Posted on by Jeff Posted in gym floor tape — No Comments ↓

After being in the tape business for twenty years, it’s not every day that learn something new. When a customer shares a new tip with us, I enjoy passing it along to you.

We’ve been working with the US Volleyball Assoc. over the last year to help develop some new floor marking products. Volleyball matches are often played on basketball gym floors and this means that a temporary playing court must be laid out over the existing basketball lines. Its a lot of work!

Gym floors require a tape that won’t damage the floor finish when its removed and we have been supplying Shurtape 724 to a number of college programs for their floor.

Laying out a playing surface on a synthetic floor requires a different product. Vinyl tapeworks better and this is where a really clever technique comes in.

Our friends at USA Volleyball put their vinyl tape in the refrigerator. They learned that when the tape is cold it doesn’t stretch, meaning that the lines are straighter and the tape is less likely to contract and pull up from the floor. It’s a great idea and it really works.

Need some tape to put temporary markings on the floor? Check in the refrigerator!

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords , OnStage Stand mic stands , Dance Floor Tape and “value added” customer service. Check withus for all your temporary floor marking needs.

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How Many Times Would I Have Liked To Have This?

Posted on by Jeff Posted in mic cables — No Comments ↓

Neutrik, the maker of a broad line of audio connectors, has a great new product that every sound person ought to know about.  Its a new style of XLR connector called theConvertcon.

convertcon.jpg

How many times have you gotten to the end of a long XLR cable run, only to discover that you had the wrong gender connector in your hand?  The Convertcon makes that a thing of the past.

By simply sliding the connector barrel forward or back, a male XLR3 connector can become a female XLR3, or vice versa.  No more coiling and rerunning the cable or digging through your tool box for a turn around.

While the cost ($12.00 or more) keeps this connector from being practical to use on all mic cables, those special long run control cables or the ones you use to interface with someone else’s equipment are where this innovative connector shines.

The problem of running a long interface cable “blind” to a remote patch bay, an outboard production truck, or an unknown facility interface just got a whole lot easier.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords , OnStage Stand mic stands and quality speaker cables.

Can Some Well Placed Gaffers Tape Help You Get What’s Coming To You?

Posted on by Jeff Posted in gaffers tape, tape — No Comments ↓

I don’t watch much television, and if I do, its usually “late night”. I’m always surprised to see how prominently musical equipment manufacturers logos are displayed when you see bands on programs like Late Night With David Letterman or The Tonight Show. While its true that some of these players have endorsement deals with the equipment makers, others don’t. More importantly, in most cases companies like Yamaha and Tama aren’t paying the networks directly for this tremendous exposure. Meanwhile companies like Ford and GM are paying millions for advertising on the same shows that might be nearly as effective.

Its a lot easier to get video exposure for your band than it was a few years ago. You Tube, cable and satellite TV, and other online channels mean that performers using musical equipment have tons of opportunities to be seen. If you are interested in the possibility of getting some sort of endorsement deal, try using a little well placed gaffers tape to cover up the logos of any equipment that might appear in your video.

You can be sure that if someone from Marshall or Fender sees you using their equipment with the logo obscured they will realize that they are missing an opportunity to put their name in front of lots of eyeballs. With a popular YouTube video getting millions of views, this type of exposure can rival that of a 3 minute performance by a popular artist on a network program.

Equipment manufacturers pay lots of money to popular performers to use and be seen with their gear. There’s no reason that you should miss out.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands. We’ve got gaffers tape in 13 colors!

This Tape Art Blew Us Away

Posted on by Jeff Posted in duct tape — No Comments ↓

spokesperson for goodbuyguys.comTape in many forms has been elevated to an art medium, and we write about it regularly.  Simple linear art using duct tape is popular with kids and carton sealing tape sculpture can be really impressive.

Still, we sometimes come across tape art installations that take our breath away.

If you have a minute, you’ll enjoy these two videos.

http://www.vimeo.com/23322827

http://www.vimeo.com/24107126

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

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