Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “DIY Hacks & How To’s: Adjustable Power Outlet”.
There are a lot of electrical devices that only have two settings on and off for many of these, it would be helpful if you could adjust the output, so in this project, i’m going to show you how to make an adjustable power outlet. This circuit acts as an external dimmer and can be used to adjust the output of a variety of appliances. The materials that you need for this project are a power cord, an insulated project, housing, a dimming circuit and an ac outlet. Normally, ac electricity is a basic sine wave, most dimming circuits work by chopping off part of this sine wave.
They do this with a semiconductor called a triac, a triac conducts electricity only after the voltage at its gate, pin reaches a certain threshold. Here’S a simple example of how this is used at the first part of each cycle. The triac is off and doesn’t conduct electricity.
The capacitor begins to charge through the variable resistor when the capacitor reaches the breakover voltage of another semiconductor called a diac. It then sends a signal to the gate of the triac and turns it on the triac, then conducts electricity to the appliance. This process happens at the first of every half cycle by adjusting the resistor. You change how quickly the capacitor charges and how much of the sine wave gets chopped off.
You can buy a variety of dimmers from your local hardware store or you can build one from scratch, start by opening up the plastic housing and deciding on the best location. For the dimmer circuit and the outlet to mount the outlet start by tracing the outline of the front faces onto the plastic housing using a knife or rotary tool cut out. Each of these sections then drill a small hole between them for the mounting screw. You can then insert the outlet and secure it in place with a screw next drill. A hole in the side of the housing for the knob of the dimmer circuit then insert the dimmer and tighten it in place with the washer and nut. Lastly, drill one more hole in the side of the housing for the power cord. Before connecting the components, you need to identify all the wires to make sure that you hook them up properly. In the united states, the white wire is neutral, the black wire is hot, and the green or bare wire is ground.
If the wires aren’t color coded, you may still be able to identify them from the plug or the texture on the insulation. Neutral wires are typically connected to the wide prong on the plug and have ridges on the side of the insulation. Hot wires are typically connected to the narrow prong on the plug and have insulation with a smooth side. Connect the ground wire to the nut on the end of the outlet then connect the white wire to the slot on the outlet. That’S labeled for white wires connect. The black wire from the power cord to the black input wire on the dimmer then connect the black output wire from the dimmer to the slot on the outlet labeled for black wires.
If your outlet only accepts solid wires, you may need to add a couple of solid core jumper wires and connect them to the other wires with twist on connector caps. After making all the connections close up, the housing and your adjustable power outlet is complete. I should point out that this kind of dimmer circuit is designed to work with simple resistive loads, such as lights and heating elements. It isn’t really suitable for inductive loads, such as motors. Also, you shouldn’t use it with devices that use power adapters or that have their own built-in control circuits, but there are still a lot of good applications for this. For instance, you can use it as an external dimmer for lamps or you can use it to adjust. The temperature of your soldering iron or hot glue gun use your imagination. Well, that’s how to make an adjustable power outlet, thanks for watching and check back next week for more diy hacks and how-tos .