Also yes I’m also going to trash the two cord pieces 🧐. The point of destroying it is to prove I won’t be keeping it, to emphasize there is no good reason to have one.

One way electricians can safely work on circuits that may become energized is by deliberately grounding/shorting them out while working on them. If someone turns it on, they will immediately blow a breaker.

As somebody who used to work in a hardware store, I cannot count on both hands and both feet the number of times I was ask to make one of these cables. Every time I would explain to the customer that it was illegal for me to do so and that it was dangerous not just to themselves but to anybody working with electricity in the vicinity to have that cable in existence. At least five times I had to get my manager to kick them out of the store

Linemen install GROUND leads when working on lines. This is because incase anyone accedentally back feeds the lines. What happens is it shorts out the backfeed to ground and causes the breaker at the feeding line transformer to blow. Then the power company will find it after they fix the lines and have a "chat" with ya.

I used to paint empty apartments for my father's business. They usually had no power. He had one of these cables, a very long one. He was super, super clear with me about how to use it. In fact, each end had a label so I wouldn't forget. One end said "DON'T DIE! Plug into unpowered end FIRST!" and the "DON'T DIE!" was much bigger than the rest of it. The end said "DON'T DIE! Do what the OTHER end says FIRST!" I didn't DIE. Thanks, dad.

True story, about 20 years ago I was an engineer working at a large corporation. My boss told me the women on the assembly line were complaining about getting shocked when they touched certain equipment. I checked it out and there were about a dozen back-to-back plugs linking all the power strips together. I asked him who had wired up the work benches and he said it was a licensed electrician. It turned out the electrician had hired a trained assistant who had done the wiring job. The electrician came out the next day and rewired all the benches for free because he knew he could lose his license over this incident. I think he also fired the assistant.

I once got an old lady asking for a male/male adapter around december and immediately told her, "you need to re-hang your christmas lights" before she even got done explaining her story. She called her husband to try and explain to me, but I just told him the exact same thing. "We don't have it. No one has it. It doesn't exist. It's dangerous and illegal." Had to repeat that at least 5 times to both of them before they gave up.

Funny story. I know somebody that back fed the grid using a cord like this and then when the grid came back on it melted his generator down..... Nobody got hurt and I think the homeowner learned their lesson...

If you use such a cable on Christmas lights you will end up with an energized plug at a random place. Some kid might find it.

I got shocked due to this insane cable. When I was teenager it was used for some equipment at a place I was doing some voluntary work. When I touched it, unaware it was connected to power, my hand immediately bounced away from it and spasmed for a couple of seconds on its own. I am lucky I was not electrocuded due to this. It probably helped that I touched it only with a single finger when it happened.

Real props for actually showing the legal basis. As a lawyer, it's refreshing to see - illustrative of the often complex way legislation works to give an industry code the weight of an enforceable law.

When I was a kid I split the wires from a computer F to M cord and accidentally touched the wires on an exposed PC case panel (when they were all steel). It welded to case and sparks flew, scared the hell out of me. Thankfully I unplugged it and threw it in the trash.

Ha! This made me laugh. Years ago a client of the company I worked for suffered an IT failure when the mains failed. My company was OK (broadcast TV with multiple UPSs and generator backup), but the client company wasn’t on it. Their IT guy (top bloke and very good with IT) decided to buy a UPS and install it himself; it didn’t work, so he asked if I could help him out. I looked at the only cable connected to it at that point, plugged into one of its outlets. I asked him where the other end was and he pointed to a mains outlet on the wall. I asked him to remove the wall end, and sure enough there was a male connector at each end and he’d fried the UPS by shoving mains up its output. He’d made up the cable himself, thinking it was how it was supposed to be. I reported a near miss and we issued a company-wide edict that nothing could be wired by any of our clients and plugged into the mains without it first being inspected and authorised by one of us.

I have been told that first responders sometimes carry "suicide connectors" to power structures on an emergency basis such as energising a gas station to access the pumps. That said it is never the right way to do an installation.

Made one of these cables at a physics class back in highschool (together with a classmate in the '80s), put a switch between the two plugs. Teacher told we could install everything but he would look up the things we made and was the only one permitted to click the switch. So he did, within a second the complete building was out of power... Learned why circuit breakers are great things (and why they are mandatory - at least in my country). Teacher said he knew what we made but relied on the circuit breaker and would use it as a story why you shouldn't craft these cables, so he did flip the switch.

Actually have a story around such a cable. From a 230 volt mains country, which makes it even more dangerous. An uncle of mine had an electric lawnmower. And it was convenient to take a cable drum, replace its plug with a receptacle, and plug this receptacle into the lawnmower. And he also made one of these death cables with 2 plugs, to plug one into an outlet and the other one into the cable drum. To pretty much use the cable drum in reverse and be able to just spool up the lawnmower's cable. He was quite a smart, handy man, I totally believe he used this setup in a relatively safe manner. And as he told me (this is like 25 years ago), it was impossible to get an "inverse cable drum" with a receptacle at the cable end back then. But sadly, he passed away at the age of about 60. And his wife kept using this contraption. When I was visiting her and was helping her mow the lawn, I actually saw her putting one plug of the death cable into an outlet while holding the other plug in her hand, totally unaware of the danger she's putting herself into. I then told her to ideally not keep using this cable at all, and if she does, to ALWAYS plug one plug into the cable drum before putting the other one in the outlet, and vice versa, to make it a bit safer and never have an open plug that's powered. It's still not great, for sure. As far as I know, she never shocked herself with this. But still, when buying/making such contraptions, don't only think of yourself, also think of others who may use it one day.

My grandfather made such a cable for his lawnmower, which he built himself. He was a genius. When he repeatedly stepped on the cable and pulled the killer plug while pushing the machine, he secured it with duct tape. Fortunately, there was no accident. Used it like that for 20 years, then I grew up and threw it all away.

Any kind of misuse of connectors intended for mains power can be dangerous. This reminded me of something that happened at a small church in our area many years ago. The amplifier sat on a shelf inside the pulpit so the mic cable could be short and the minister could reach the controls when needed. They wanted to make it easy to move the pulpit out of the way when they used the platform for things like the Xmas play so someone who probably thought they were clever wired the speakers to a standard 120V receptacle mounted in the platform floor right next to the live receptacle that the amp plugged into for power, then attached a cord with a 2 prong male power plug to the amp's speaker terminals. It worked OK as long as it was re-connected by the person who set it up that way but I'm sure most people reading this have already figured out what happened when someone with no clue about how things like that work tried plugging it back in. The only damage was totally destroyed power output transistors in the amp (which I ended up replacing for them and recommended changing to standard 1/4" phone plugs & jacks before it happened again). They were very lucky; One of the amp's speaker terminals was connected to the chassis so there was a 50/50 chance that the amp's housing would be live when someone tried to turn it on.

Also called a widow maker. The main breaker must be shut off first and the plugs must all be attached to CFI plug BEFORE starting the generator to prevent most hazzards and potential death. Just spend the 600 to 800 bucks and get a manual switch installed.

Here in Australia, hardware stores used to sell a popular wire-it-yourself plug called a "piggy-back plug". The idea is that you can put it into a wall socket, but the back of the plug has another socket so you could plug something else in, too. Unfortunately, people were making their own extension cables and putting a piggy-back plug on instead of a proper line socket (which were no more difficult to buy). So the DIY piggy-back plugs got banned and cannot be purchased. Moulded ones on manufactured leads are still okay, though, and that's now the only time most people see piggy-back plugs.

not quite the same topic but many years ago [here in the uk most houses will have an electric kettle] i went into the kitchen only to find my 3 year old daughter sitting on the floor with the end of the kettle lead in her mouth while the other end was plugged into the wall socket .I yanked the lead from her mouth and all was well and i was so happy to see that my wife had switched the socket off after using the kettle . i wasted no time in having the lead shortened so it would no longer trail over the countertop

I like the meme that some hardware stores put by the electrical cables, saying, "These are not made. They should never be made..." As for these allowing generators to backfeed into the grid, linemen are taught to assume that the lines are energized and take appropriate precautions partly due to possibility of generators backfeeding into the lines.

This was a really good video. I do have one correction though. At 2:50 when you show bus 1 and bus 2, this configuration is incorrect. Every other row from top to bottom is Bus 1 or Bus 2. The two buses are woven together like when you interlock your fingers. Very informative video still ❤

Now you have 2 dangerous cables! 😂

plot twist, he only cut it so he could extend it with speaker wire

"Electricians assuming that the lines are not powered" That's not a thing. That was never a thing.

Slightly related - I saw a video on UKposts a few months ago about battery storage units being developed which feed power into the wall socket when discharging. In concept, you charge the battery when power is cheap (time of use tariff, or solar PV) and then discharge it later to reduce your utility bill. From the video (sorry, I don't have a link) these are in the pre-production phase so probably a year or so from being available for sale. Also being portable, you can take them with you when you move house, avoid installation costs etc. No details about safety interlocks (it was only a couple of minutes of bonus content at the end of a video on solar batteries), but presumably you would need to be 100% sure that the pins can't energise when its unplugged. Its not much different to a combined suicide lead and portable power station. PS - I'm from the UK so unfamiliar with US regulations.

5:44 - to be clear, you should not use them. However, this is code is actually for electricians and those who make electronics, not consumers. So this code doesn't say it is illegal to own/use, only to sell (or for an electrician to install) such devices - at least from my understanding. In other words, the general public isn't expected to know electrical code, but anything they use is expected to follow it, which these do not. Another note, do not cut cables open like this: 1) you are making more ends of the cable 2) if it isn't a death cable, you may have pushed a strand from one wire to another

I stayed on a Riverboat which was powered by solar with a generator backup. They had one of these cables. I tried to tell the owners they should fit a fuse between the generator and the Solar control box as it could save them a lot of money. One day the system was refusing to accept charge from a new generator they bought as the generator didn't have a regulator or whatever it is which controls demand, so they revved the generator manually to make it start to charge. Within seconds the fuse inside the control box blew in a puff of smoke. I proceeded to tell them very quickly that they should have listened and installed a fuse, it also very clearly stated it on the input. They had to send the unit for repair as the repair required soldering. Funny thing is that the owners were apparently electricians. This wasn't the only danger in this boat, they also stored the gas canisters on top of the batteries. True stupidity of epic proportions. The fire from the batteries if one had taken place would not have struggled to burn straight through gas canister and turn a bad fire into a massive explosion! It was obvious they didn't learn either as they electrocuted themselves several times with this cable, one time moments after I has reminded him that he is holding a live cable with the pins exposed. He literally touched it to check not believing me! This highlights a really big issue with Solar power as far as I am concerned. Many people try to DIY these systems with varying levels of experience and knowledge. They think because it runs on batteries that it is relatively safe compared to mains power. The batteries, capacitors, transformers and even solar panels all contain more than enough juice to kill a human easily.

Funny thing, an assembly line where I used to work, we had those "cord reels" coming down from the ceiling all over the place, so we could plug in our drills and such. There was one cord reel in the entire building that for whatever reason had a male end and was effectively always live and would shock anyone who walked past and accidentally brushed against it (a common occurrence, as we were walking in the narrow space alongside the trucks we were building). No one could ever figure out why that plug was male, as none of our tools had female ends. As long as I worked there, that plug never got fixed. Most likely, a rather silly maintenance man had at some point replaced the plug end on that cord and just put the wrong type of connector on it.

4:45 The NEC only makes it illegal in the sense of wiring up a building/house incorrectly. It doesn't make the simple possession, or making one, illegal.

to anyone looking to power their house: 1. always get a generator that can produce 240v (250) 2. if you have such generator, mechanical interlock kits can be had for very cheap for most electrical panels of the last 50 years, and a 50 or 30 amp inlet can be had cheaply, just get something UL listed for outdoor use (NEMA 3/4) with its respective 8/3 or 10/3 grounded cable 3. these days a 50 amp inlet would always be recomended, the cost difference is not much, so it is worth getting a step up L14-30P to L14-50R adapter if you have a smaller generator, instead of locking your house to 1 heavy appliance regardless of generator (water heater, oven/range/cooktop, HVAC, well pump, (derated) car charger, other heating) 4. always use a generator that is configured to produce proper split phase 120 and 240 (125/250v) - if it just has a single wall outlet, it should NOT be wired into your home in any way - use 12/3 extensions instead, only a true split phase unit should interface with your homes wiring in any way to begin with

“You heard there was a secret cord That you could use to meet the Lord Cause you don't care about power safety, do you?”

Hey Ferb, I know what- My lawyer has advised me to not finish this joke.

My grandfather in the countryside had such a homemade cable. In the past, it was often the case that one of the three phases was missing, and while each such failure prevented the equipment on the farm from working, when it hit the phase where the house was connected, it created a big problem, because these failures could last up to several days. So my grandfather's solution was to install a socket on the roofed part of the terrace, where there was an electricity meter, connected to one of the phases of a three-phase fuse, but different from the one in the house, which was normally used to power the radio with speakers in the yard. But in the event of the lack of the phase where the house was connected, my grandfather took this suicidal extension cord, only he knew where it was and only he could use it, he turned off the single-phase fuse of the house in the electrical box, connected this extension cord to the socket in the hall near the exit where the single-phase meter was originally and the wires spread throughout the house, and through the front door he connected the other end to a socket on the covered terrace. The house had power, everyone was happy, and since only two people lived there, i.e. my grandparents, no one picked on the cable or messed with it. I only remember once when he had to do it when the whole family was there, that's how I found out about it, and everyone had one rule that no one except grandpa could touch this wire, even by accident. Then grandpa drove two big screws into the wooden walls, one at each socket, and tied the ends tightly with a strong braided string, so that even if someone caught in the wire and pulled it out, the head of the wire would not move away from the wall socket any further than about 5 centimeters. Of course, in case of a long loss of all phases, the generator was also at hand so that it could be started on the exposed part of the terrace connected with this cable, but fortunately it was never needed.

I'm surprised you were able to order one. I assumed you just made it yourself, since making one would be trivial.

Yep, I've made my own for powering the house through the dryer outlet. Step 1 - Main Breaker Off Step 2 - All Breakers Off including Dryer Breaker Step 3 - Unplug Dryer and Plug cable in both ends. Step 4 - Start Generator Step 5 - Dryer Breaker On Step 6 - Power on only essential breakers such as freezer, fridge, lights. No 220v breakers other than the dryer breaker is on. Just 15a circuits. Coming off of Generator is the opposite. Power off all breakers, including dryer breaker. Stop Generator Unplug Backfeed Cable and Plug in Dryer Main Breaker On Finally All Circuits one at a time As long as you know what you are doing and know your main breaker works, this can be done safely. I've had to use it once the 16 years I've been in this home. It's a 6kw Generator set that produces 220v. I can run enough lights, fridge and at least one of my two gas furnaces. It won't run my AC or my electric dryer, hence they are the donor circuits to backfeed into the panel. As long as the main is off, this is no danger to anyone. But if you don't know what you are doing, yeah, don't do this.

I never knew backfeeding is a thing. There has been exactly two times I connected my generator during an outage and forgot to disconnect the circuit breakers first. Instead of energizing the whole grid, the breaker in the generator tripped in one case and the generator sputters to a halt in the other.

Speaking of the breaker: I saw an option where you literally have a big Y-tumbler basically, that is connected to this female generator plug. In order to feed power from the plug, you forcefully disconnect the grid. Basically it sits even before the breakers so everything is still protected correctly through the breakers, but is now feeding from the generator line. I think this is the best design as it's easy to set up and actively prevents any potential disaster. If the Generator line is turned on, the Grid line is cut off by design.

That's one way to test my grounds while working on a supposed dead powerline. I've heard of a few guys who were seriously injured from backfeed.

I’ve got 2 of those, I was advised to keep them at least 12 feet apart as any closer would cause the earth to stop rotating.😂

We have different plugs where I live but because power outages are so frequent here EVERYONE runs their generator on our version of the suicide cable. Most people are very good about switching off the main though, which is why it isn't an issue, but some idiot somewhere didn't get the memo and paid the price.

I am here as an electrician to bestow a quirky lil fun fact on yall! You can buy two male connectors and some cable and with a Philips head screwdriver and a pocket knife, you can make these. 😂

Actually.. The NEC codes are building codes--they only govern the electrical installations of buildings. So you could legally own one of these cables, but they should not be installed. Pretty sure the HotPlug used to seize a desktop computer from a Wall Outlet without powering the PC down (For the purpose of preserving evidence stored in RAM) creates a situation where you essentially have one of these during the process; Regardless of whether you are seizing using the Plug capture method or Cutting out the whole wall outlet --- There are exposed energized conductors at a point in time during the operation That then need to be manually covered or taped up before walking the UPS and the Equipment being seized out of the building.

Hi ThioJoe, Well, when my house was built 15 years ago, the dumb electrician put in, at my request, a generator access panel. He put a female 3 prong socket outside the house. This means, to connect to the generator, you need one of your cords, only longer. I told him that it should be a male plug, but he knew better. It's now fixed and proper ... now, I don't need your death cord.

Made one to power my generator, to use exactly the way you say not to. My family's been doing this for years. The electric company even told us how, and where to get the parts to make this cord. The only thing they asked was that we turn off the main breaker to the house before connecting the generator to avoid the backfeeding. Never had a single problem in over two decades.

Joe, although you showed using a blue plastic lockout on the main circuit breaker, you did not mention installing a transfer box: mine was installed by a licensed electrician, went next to the main panel, had a large metal conduit for up to eight legs, and provided switches so each leg could be set to Line (normal), Off, or Gen. It works great and does not need a "suicide cord."

One thing I also see this useful is maybe you have to power something in a flat that is currently vacant, thus doest not have an electricity contract active, and this thing is hardwired (e.g. a gas boiler because you have to service it before the new tennant comes in), and you make one of these cords to power a socket circuit from a communal service. But yes, not a great solution, would be better to make a temporary connection at the main electric panel with a cord with a plug on the other side. I've seen time to time this cable made a lot of times tough, most of the time for uses that were really stupid (e.g. a homemade electric appliance that for convenience of having a removable cord used a standard socket to feed power into it, instead of the correct solution that is an IEC socket. But you know, who built it probably had an old socket laying around and did that).

The video with the plug on fire needs to be changed to a guy being shocked. This is *NOT* the danger with higher voltage; that's _lower_ voltage i.e. higher amps. Higher voltages require increasingly smaller and smaller wires to carry the same power. if a wire is too skinny for a given amperage, just up the volts!

Powering the house from an outlet can be done safely, depends on the installation (turning off the grid connection)

the christmas light version of this is safely solvable using powerline data transmission. have a two part system consisting of an end cap (goes on what would be explosed male end on the other side of the string) and a connector section (acts as the male-to-male connection), such that the connector section will refuse to energize its prongs until it recieves communication from the cap that the other end is safely covered.

I think linemen when working on a downed or broken line will put grounds on the feeder lines as a precaution so if by some reason that line becomes energized by a back feeding generator it will go to ground and blow a breaker or fuse instead of electrocuting the workers but yes i wouldnt use this death cord either. If i had a generator for the house a licensed electrician would install it and make sure theres a shut off so it doesnt backfeed the power grid

This is one of the best videos you have ever posted.

So this is the gay cord?

Never seen one before seeing it here, but that was almost a certainty being I worked as a maintenance man in a production facility. I helped wire a building that was about half an acre under roof. Everything from the switch room in was done by our team.

I’ve worked with my local emergency response unit they have one of these cables deliberately to power up rooms. The cable has keyed locks on both sides and is in special compartment. I have sadly run into two of these cables and daily use in my industry. Both have been from tax who just aren’t paying attention repairing cables. Both times I’ve had to hold an understand, electricity courses. Because if you can put two male ends on a cable that means you’re not testing it that means a lot of things.

Years ago I made up one of these when Hydro shut off my Ex's power for not paying her bill. She lived in a duplex which had exterior outlets at the rear so I plugged one end into the neighbours and the other into hers. The lights did come on but they were really dim, possibly because the hot water tank was still in circuit and drawing most of the power.

why would you not use a 2$ cable to backfeed using your generator? just remember to close the main breaker before plugging in the generator

If one didn't shut off the main house breaker before hooking this dangerous cable up, it would be likely to trip the breaker in the generator anyhow because it would probably throw the neighborhood's load onto the generator. So, a sustained backfeed is quite unlikely. It is safest and best -- and the only code compliant way -- to do this the right way anyhow, with a connector panel and a transfer switch and a special subpanel for the things you want the generator to keep going, like refrigerator and water pump.

I used a similar male to male on my caravan, I dont know if the cable is the problem but I did had an accident, once i had the mains connected to the caravan and mistakenly turned the inverter on, fried the inverter, the cable and the battery but I believe the safe bet is to have the breakers set as you showed allowing only one option to be powering wtv you are powering, although if you set up a breaker system probably you can hardwire from the inverter to the breaker rather than having this makeshift cables

Should have just sent it to Electroboom when you were done with it :)

This cable is perfect for my selective use scenario! I'm going to make one if I cannot buy one this week. Off-Grid Solar power is routed through an inverter to power my AC panel to all the outlets. Right now I've routed the "shore power" cord and outlet to the inverter feeding the main breaker. Now that I'm ready to add a backup generator to selectively charge the batteries and power the outlets, I need a quick, convenient, and economic way to switch between the inverter and generator, if there's no "sine wave" issues from anything connected to the outlets when using the generator to power them. First of all, I live in an large RV trailer so it runs off a single plug-in cord by design. My batteries and 2,000 watt PSW inverter are near the heavy duty water heater AC outlet running to a dedicated breaker. I plan to put the "shore power" cord back outside and connect it to the generator. There's no reasonable way to hardwire into the 120v inverter for a connection and hardwiring into the RV's outlet would leave the male plug energized when "shore" powered. One, probably much better with two, of these from the female inverter outlet to the RV's plugged in with the main breaker turned off (going to the generator) for the majority of the time. Then when wanting/needing the generator, pull those "Satanic" cords out completely, setting them aside, and/or turn off the water heater breaker (if not needing that outlet). However, I could hard wire into the outlet and just turn off the water heater breaker to de-energize the male cable(s) going to the inverter outlet(s). However, I actually like the idea of the double safety and physical re-arrangement in case I forget to randomly switch the breaker off. What do you think, have I found an actual real-world, safe use for this type of device? I think I'd be safer using one than not in my specific use and life-style.

I made one last year to be able to power a new manufactured home (prior to the electric being hooked up) so I could run the vacuum and have some lights using my generator. It worked as expected. I did stop using it and had it disconnected well before the electric was run from the home to the pole. Once the electric was hooked up I properly installed the generator by hooking it up to the electric panel with a safety disconnect. They do serve a specific purpose when used with safety in mind but there are way too many people that don't think first when doing dangerous stuff like messing with electricity so I can understand the ban.

If they are interested in safety, they should require all AC plugs have a ridge on them so that your fingers won't slip and accidentally touch the exposed prongs as you are inserting the plug into the socket. This happened to me when I was a kid and I got some jolt up my arm. Some plugs have them but mostly the cheap plugs don't. The ridge also makes it easier to grip the plug.

Those cables are actually very easy to make at home. If someone can't make one themselves, it's probably an extra reason to not use them, because they don't know what they're messing with.

Okay, but why do people make them?

Currently disconnected 🤣 I see watt you did there. 😁 Also, the ppl on Reddit are correct. My 240VAC water heater is hooked up this way.

You are missing the legitimate use for these cables. They are the proper way to connect a 127 to 220, 220 to 127 transformer as it only have outlets.

I made something like this with two different standards (EU/chinese) BUT only the ground (earth) was connected inside; the goal was of course to transmit the ground from a chinese outlet to EU power strips. It looked extremely sketchy but was in fact safer to have.

They are a Code violation but not illegal. No criminal charge can be brought for having/using them.

Normally Christmas lights have built in fuses which make them safer to plug something into than an actual extension cord. In this case I'm wondering if the fuse would pop from that. Since the amount of voltage is normal would the fuse let it happen until the energized end touched something? Would it stop it at all? Are there any electricians in the house to answer this?

It's best to shut the main breaker off on your house before you back feed a generator into your house to prevent sending electricity down the main lines. I have done it for years and never had a problem. I use the dryer plug in my garage.

As an Automation Engineer, I simply can buy two male plugs and assemble them together. Have I done that? - Yes! But I wasn't paying attention when I had to create 20 cables which lead to that male-male cable. Without using it, I disassembled it and fixed it.

Two residential outlets will never be on two different phases.

I seen manual switch for toggle between main grid or genarator. That's a like gear. Another danger associates with this you try to power whole circuit via power outlet full house load on outlet.... In backwards

Been using to power up the bus rail for many years when testing power in foreclosures, but I'm also an electrician and do it properly so as not to back feed beyond the house...Not at all saying people should do this, but it can safely be done with proper protocol...

PA leaves building code enforcement up to local municipalities - so it's even trickier to know how the law is going to be applied on these things here. Anyways, you can buy and sell the cable - even use it if whatever you are using it with is not permenantly incorporated into a building in any way. You can even intend to use it, as long as you haven't yet you won't be arrested for one of those thought crimes the state and federal government enjoys throwing at people.

Just to be specific, literally in the text that you showed on screen, near the bottom... Who does that Texas law apply to? Essentially electricians, appliance installers, etc etc but not homeowners. It's perfectly legal for me to own that. It's perfectly legal for me to possess it. And it's perfectly legal for me to use it in a really unsafe way in the house as long as I'm not backfeeding to the power grid. So it's not illegal for them to sell it It's not illegal for people to use it. It's dumb. It violates that third party code there that the state adopted to be applied to electricians but if you look at how it applied it doesn't apply to everyone. It's not law.

I use a 240V 50A suicide cable for my home generator. I use a suicide cable because the 240V outlet I feed through is an RV/EV outlet out in my driveway. They are safe if you know how to use them.

In theory a back-fed generator to the grid connexion will energise the local section of grid to dangerous voltages, but I would suspect in practice what would happen is that you would simply overload your generator, best case tripping the AC breaker. Worst case popping the whole genny! Think about it. If you forget to turn off your main supply isolator the power will flow onto the grid and attempt to run all your neighbour's loads as well. And if if it hits a transformer backwards, that secondary winding, which is now operating as the primary is going to pull one hell of a magnetising current. Effectively you're running your genny's output into something close to a dead short.

"Destroying" Then theres someone getting it out your bin and soldering the wires back together lol

Used a homemade one to power an older mobile home that had been fully disconnected from the grid for years and relocated to a spot that it was never hooked up and used for storage. Powered it with my inverter. I did this for a couple hours so I could run lights to find something that could have been anywhere at the time. My gf at the time pulled in and was morbidly freaked out because she knew damn well this trailer had no power yet it was fully lit up and didn’t see my truck behind it powering it 😂

I'm gonna pick one of these up and put it on my knick knack display shelf. Or just make one. Got all sorts of oddball shit that probably shouldn't be actually used there, including some of the infamous DeathDaptors.Hell I might plug it into a couple of deathdaptors up there.

That's pretty cool. I had a classmate in middle school make something like this with a pair of scissors. There was a pop and smoke and a burnt outlet after that!

There is no law that makes having a cable like that illegal. It can't be sold because it's a non-compliant product. Any ban on its use is directly related to running your house off of it when you need a transfer switch to protect lineworkers.

"Educational purposes only". Yeah right!

i have seen these type of cords used in the Philippines..example your neighbor in the provinces is paying for electricity and you do not have electricity so with or without permission you run a cord from their house to yours..bear in mind houses in the provinces do not usually have breakers just knife switches to disconnect from the mains...when you see in the news that a house in the PI catches fire then burns 20 other houses to the ground it is usually due to an electricity issue ..extension cords plugged into extension cords then every device in the house plugged into that P50 (USD $1) extension cord...

I remember having one of these to power an old camper trailer that my parents had. You had to plug it into the camper first, and then use an extension cord to plug it into the house. I wouldn't recommend using one. I got electrocuted once from accidentally sticking my thumb into a laptop charger plug while it was plugged in, and I thought that was bad enough.

I laugh every time I see one of these. My 'evil' brain wants to call them idiot detectors..... I just think it's so very strange that you'd even go down this route. Then again, I'm in networking and IT and certainly NOT an electrician. :D

Very well said for a non licensed electrician. You must have a relative in the trade

In my state, before ANY repair or maintenance on a line, electricians must short and ground all wires at the same time. This means that all the wires will be connected to each other, and each wire will also be connected to the ground by a second conductor (device). Plus, after this operation, the voltage on the conductors still has to be measured. Furthermore, normal voltage 230/400V is used, which has countless advantages (for example, we do not have "split" circuits). According to the decree, every house should have a circuit breaker near the electricity meter (the distribution company has fuses on the pole in front of it, and the circuit breaker behind the electricity meter is my property) and a main switch at the entrance to the house, only then other circuit breakers follow, so I can disconnect the house from the network without any problems in several places. I myself have such a cable that I made myself, I have it to connect the UPS to the house.

I'm interning in a datacentre and one rack has these cables for some reason and they're powered on, so any time the ends touch something sparks fly

cable can't be illegal. Cabel is cable. I will make them anyway.

Funny you didn't mention the first thing I thought of: If you plug both ends in different outlets of the same house, if one outlet has the wires inverted, it will short the entire thing

I know someone who sometimes wears funny hats and also glasses who has used these on a couple of occasions. He's an electronics tech and is fully aware of the dangers and took the necessary precautions. One time didn't use that style of connector (he is Aussie) but used a bayonet style light fitting to liven up his houses light circuit so he could work in the dark while building his house.

For my hurricane ready home in Fl. I have moved away from generators and use battery inverters inside. Same results only safer and easier to strategically employ during a storm, plus nobody can steal them like during the year of hurricanes (2004-2005) thieves would steal gas too!

You know someone's gonna dig that cut cable out of the trash and put it back together using duct tape and coins! 😂

3:04 In America, 240 Volts are "twice as dangerous". In severe Russia, 230 Volts are running normally, and 380 Volts are between phases.

As an old time amateur radio operator from way back, "suicide cords" were an essential part of anyone's shack. In my High School radio club, we discovered the school's bells were all wired in parallel and that each bell plugged into a standard 120V socket. By removing a bell and jumping in a suicide cord from the nearest powered socket, we could ring the bells at will. The other classic variant was a plug on one end and a couple of alligator clips on the other. Had a lot of fun with those too. (By cracky, kids were a lot tougher in those days...)

I've heard these referred to in the UK as a 'widowmaker' cable and that's coming from a country that has switched sockets so you could have such a thing plugged in and *not* live. Unlike the US where switched receptacles are either very rare or non-existent.