ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Electrical-related motion picture trivia

Wow. Thanks guys.

Wonder where I could buy a male/female set of those scary things...just for old-times sake. LOL

You're right on the ticket, mamills. I forgot that there were porcelain verstions for multiple plugs. The last time I saw any of these was about 15 years ago before an old theatre pianoboard was demo-ed.

I've only seen a couple in real life and never had the "pleasure" of touching any that were still in service...

Sven:
Believe it or not, I've actually seen these items pop up once in a while on eBay (after all, doesn't everything in the world eventually end up on eBay?). Look for "stage plug". Perhaps an EC working with a theatrical supply company re-fitting an auditorium or theater might help.

Mike:
When I was living in Denver and in grade school, my elementary and junior high schools used these guys backstage ...yeah, in a school auditorium of all places. They were located in heavy cast-iron floor pockets on each side of the stage - each pocket containing one or two porcelain receptacles, stage plugs, and a short amount of S or SO cable with an ordinary edison connector attached. I was indoctrinated to these things at a REAL early age .

Mike (mamills)


[This message has been edited by mamills (edited 01-05-2006).]

I found a version of this picture and managed to lighten it, however it's on a russian cracking site and probably not hot-linkable, any email address I should send to for it to be posted on the ECN server? (the usage probably comes under the fair usage terms for copyright, seeing as it's a discussion about the movie prop )

You can send it to me via the email link above my post.

Bump

That doesn't look like any connector I've seen before... The contacts on the side of the male do look pretty beefy, and I'd guess a rating somewhere around 50A. The female end on that thing looks pretty scary unless there's some kind of shutter system to hide the live contacts...

The connector box in his left hand is a receptacle for a 100amp stage plug (paddle).

The plug in his right hand looks like either a 100amp stage plug or a big Mueller clip (jumper cable)..

If it's a stage plug, it has an oversized handle.

As previously mentioned, stage plugs came in two sizes. The full sized 100amp plug, and the 1/2 sized 50 amp plug, which was frequently fused down to 20 or 30 amps.

I may have one of those plugs in my junkbox somewhere.. I'll have to check.

I have seen some 3 pole versions of the stage plug, which was a pentagonal shape, but I have only seen that in one venue.

The other common connectors used in theatre (besides the NEMA and non-NEMA twist-lock connectors) are the stage pin connectors, which come in 20, 30, 60, and 100 amp versions. Also known as Bates connectors.
These have 3 (or sometimes 2 if you find an old one) round pins, unequally spaced in a straight line on a plastic or phenolic block.

These are commonly found in theatres that regularly support road shows, and/or use a lot of rental equipment, as well as on equipment supplied by the rental houses, while NEMA and non-NEMA twistlocks are more frequently found in schools and other facilities that own their own equipment.

I found a few photos on ebay.. not the greatest quality when blown up, but they will have to do for now..




The top picture shows a 4 outlet Mole Box, manufactured by Mole-Richardson. These were normally fed with bundled welding cable.
The next row, and the lower right show a couple variations on a full sized 100amp Mole Plug, also known as a stage plug. These had a couple of different contact arrangements, including the shorter versions shown here, and one with longer contacts (~1.5").

The lower left image shows a 1/2 size Mole Plug. Two of these would fit side by side in a single outlet.

[This message has been edited by Webmaster (edited 01-10-2006).]

[This message has been edited by techie (edited 01-10-2006).]