Black cube taps
- Thread startergafftapegreenia
- Start date
Regardless of the color, don't try bringing any into the Las Vegas Convention Center, and many other trade show floors.
huh? if that was the case then every outlet everywhere that is sprinklered would need to be weatherproof.
Outlets dont have a minimum distance from the floor, you can even put them in the floor which is quite common in commercial spaces which also happen to be sprinklered. Then theres outlet strips and such sitting on the floor.
As I mentioned above it has to do with overcurrent protection.
Things like cube taps are illegal in many venues because most people have no idea how to use them properly i.e., not overloading them. In general cube taps should handle no more than a 15 amp load. I personally fear any cube taps that aren't grounded.
I would say 'not permitted' instead of 'illegal' but yes, many venues do not permit them. Theyre not for plugging a pair of 1K pars into a cable, thats for sure, but theyre perfect for LED lights, and a million other small loads.
Right. I find mine invaluable for powering Seachangers and music stand lights.
I prefer a Lex O'Stringer for such lights. No not saying Lex better than any other supplier, just the only one that makes them. Wish they could do an 18" on center version with medium screw lampholders also L5-15 pigtail outlets on a stringer with wire rope cores for rigging or suspending the things. Would be really useful, much less code compliant for doing stringers of lamps in black wiring and stringers for powering up Kabuki drops.
Normally I stay away from the cube tap type in the above photo, can't tape the connection where a more or less "+" or cross shape you can. This plus the ground falls off on the above photo type seemilgly a little more readily than with the T-Shape harder plastic molded. Normally I just buy Menards out of their stock of green ones when I restock and only stock the black Lex ones for resale purposes. Interesting that it's been a year or two since the last time I had to restock our cube taps - used to be a every few month thing in restocking them. Either more places are not allowing them thus they are not getting used and lost or ground pin broken off as much or somehow I think not possible we just are not loosing as many per year. This or there just is not as much Edison type gear in use in needing them.
Thing I most dislike in often coming out of convention centers from shows is 1900 boxes with cord whip often 25' long and duplex outlets. (Normally in really ratty condition - slugs busted in, covers or strain relief loose, receptacles busted or loose, no grounding lead to the box etc. and plug badly installed.) Quite a few per year find their way back with our gear. Totally against code specific to that application even if they have an indicator light on them. One fire inspector had me do at one point for an in-shop purpose an indicator light on a quad box feeding a work station. Normally we send stray gear back to the owner when such gear is labeled for an owner. This is an automatic taking apart in not giving back. Question might be if a Bell box quad box with covers and indicator light might be code or locally compliant assuming it's plugged into a breakered distro.
Cube tap or a 1900 (in-wall quad box) I often see, which would you consider more safe in many convention centers from what I can tell by way of returned lost gear do the ladder for plugging in Edisons? This all given we sent lots of power strips out on shows - probably depends on the location much for power strip or cube tap for the limited times it's Edison instead of twist or stage pin. This plus it often ain't possible to reset the breaker on a power strip and if powered by an AC distro and assumed there is a dimmer person on-site to watch the gear, such a notion of a remote breaker on gear, much less a switch on gear not bypassed is kind of counter productive. Got this guy back stage sitting around reading a book and on the hooks... hey Ship, check X breaker.
Worst I ever did, or almost did was on my first show at a store front theater. Had this rainbow effect I was doing with somewhere between 30 and 50 pinspots along a short wall. (All I had left to do it with and what the heck it was late at night.) How to power them up??? Hey, we have a bunch of cube taps.... one can imagine the like two or three foot long length of cube taps spider web of them all connected together in ready to plug into power before I had an appiffony.... back of my head calculating and thinking about what I was about to do, "hey, we can't do this". The TD of the theater had he seen it will have killed us for even thinking we could.
Anyway, over the years I don't think I have ever seen a NEC rule about how many cube taps one can plug together into one big web or spiral of wires coming out of such a thing - this other than a "Professional workmanlike manner" coverall rule which this mess to attempt to attach to the pipe in support of it wouldn't have complied with. Did it the next morning differently and got my pinspot rainbow that was OK in effect.
Nother funny I think thing I did way back when. Stage pin cube taps. Had a customer a few years ago wanting them, Union Connector still makes them with a male cord whip or without and panel mount plug to it - cord whip better but still not the nicest way of dressing the wire when in a stage pin cube tap. Stage pin molded twofers and threefers are much better and nicer in as it were "cube tapping" for dressing and supporting the connections. Assuming such a thing as a molded twofer or threefer wouldn't get rejected by a convention center, what if it were Edison in bringing up an interesting question. Electrically no difference between a cube tap and threefer, how might they accept one without the other? This given they don't make stage pin powerstrips and by NEC one plug type verses the other is acceptable for use?
But the funny part of the rememberance from years gone by was a set of stage pin cube taps I once inherited. One was three pin, the other non-grounded to which I set out to make a grounded cube tap in not being able to afford gear. Easy enough to do, just a question of accuracy in making the third hole - mine were not as accurate or on a slight angle in that the plugs into it didn't go in all the way - oops. Wonder what ever happened to them years gone by. Almost never see stage pin cube taps these days. This in I would consider one of them over a in my opinion still not code compliant "plug as an interconnection device" (though I lost that debate in a past debate on the forum) use of the male stage pin plug with two whips for female connectors coming out of it.
Overall still, a question about those places that reject cube taps, do they also reject twofers and threefers? I would tend to doubt it and given that would wonder about the specific reasons why they don't allow them not that I don't agree.
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