Three years ago I was in Cali (Colombia) and staying at my cousin's house.

I noticed his wife's 40-50 year old flat iron (made in Colombia by General Electric) had a cloth cord where the outer jacket was so chewed up she had actually made a sleeve for it (she's pretty talented with the sewing machine).

The rubber strain relief boot was also chewed up (must have been a dog or something that got hold of it).

The replacement snap-together dead-front rubber plug someone had fitted ages ago was also crumbling. It was so bad that you didn't even need to pry out the front with a screwdriver anymore - it all just puled apart with one good yank and lots of sticky black flecks get stuck all over your palms.

So one day I took the heel plate of the iron off, detached the cord and boot and went downtown to an electrical supplier. I showed him the cord and asked if he had more of the same.

"No, we don't sell that stuff anymore."

He then produced a hank of 18/2 HPN (heater parallel neoprene) with crimped ring terminals at one end and a molded plug on the other plus a new strain relief boot.

Iron's back in business. [Linked Image]

Why don't the European appliance manufacturers use the neoprene jacketed cords for their irons and hotplates and stuff? That cloth stuff seems sort of archaic to me.

Then again I was never a big fan of it to begin with.

I have an Australian Astor radio. Small table-top plastic transistorized set from the 1970s or something. It's got like 9 or 10 feet of cord covered EARTHED flex in the old black/red/green colour code.

Picture the flex on the back of your computer, now instead of a black or tan jacket, picture it wrapped in grey fabric. That's what it is.

The conductors are insulated in thermoplastic so they're still sound. However, the cloth jacket has unraveled in a few places. I will most likely replace it with a hank of American cord when I get around to tinkering with the innards and cleaning it up... it's three-conductor from a vacuum cleaner and matches the color of the radio....so it won't look that out of place. [Linked Image]

Why did Ozzie radio manufacturers have to make the cords that LOOOOONNG? Was it so you could plug the radio into the lightbulb socket hanging from the ceiling?

[This message has been edited by SvenNYC (edited 09-14-2003).]