Re: [TCML] China Made Variac

[Steve Ward <steve.ward@xxxxxxxxx>]

My indirect experience with those things is that there were at least 2 major
problems with them.  1) the brush surface was *rough* at the ends of the
winding, giving bad contact.  2) on this particular model we had from
Mastech (i think) there were binding posts rather than a cord/plug, and the
way they had isolated the binding posts meant all the current had to go
through the edge of a brass washer, which of course only works by chance and
ended up arcing and had to get rebuilt with proper hardware.  Its amazing
that the thing worked at all (actually, sometimes it didnt until i fixed
it).

I wouldnt doubt that you could get a decent one, though, their quality
control seems to be the issue.  Im certainly guilty of buying cheap crap
with the intention of making it better (lots of tools are this way), and
sometimes it works.  Maybe they will get better in the future, or maybe some
models are better than others.  I personally wouldnt bother with them, and
would just go for a used variac from a more reputable manufacturer (GE,
staco, superior, etc..).

Steve

On Tue, Apr 5, 2011 at 12:10 AM, John Paul Gripp <pupman@xxxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:

> Does anybody have any experience with China made variacs such as the one
> available via the link below.   Is there a reason I should stay away from
> them?
>
>
>
>
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Metered-Variac-Variable-AC-Output-Transformer-20-Amp-/38
> 0315520038?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0
> <
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Metered-Variac-Variable-AC-Output-Transformer-20-Amp-/3
> 80315520038?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item588c924c26#ht_2046wt_1139>
> &hash=item588c924c26#ht_2046wt_1139
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> JP
>
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