Unusual Use for the Pliers Wrench

[dnschmidt]

If you still use wirenuts (which I don't as I'm strictly a WAGO man) I found an unusual use for the Pliers Wrench. Using wirenuts you're suppose to twist the wires together nice and tight prior to applying the wirenut. This isn't the easiest thing to do since normal pliers used to hold the wires being twisted together have a pivot point which enables only one wire to be truly gripped by the wire holding plier as the jaws are not parallel. The Pliers Wrench's jaws are parallel so all the wires being twisted together are gripped uniformly making the twisting operation using your linesman pliers much simpler. As with most things in life I found this out by random chance as all I had to hold the wires being twisted was a Pliers Wrench.

 

[66HertzClone]

I was thinking about how the Engineer brand linesman plies might work. Seems like the slot intended to grip the stripped screw heads would provide a great way to grip wires when twisting them together.

 

[dscheidt]

About 100,000 wirenuts get installed everyday using a pair of linesman pliers to do the twisting. It's not a problem that they mash the end of the wire, because you cut that bit off. It's also going to get chewed up when you put the wirenut on and the screw inside it bites into the wires.
(Also, the manufacturers of wirenuts, who have some idea how they work, all say you don't need to pretwist.)

 

[YesIHaveAHammer]

Used mine as a press with drifts to remove and install small bushings.

I wonder if any other small tools could be used in them similarly.

 

[Steve_P]

I use the PW for this also; I've had a loose wire before I started doing this.

 

[Codyboy]

About 100,000 wirenuts get installed everyday using a pair of linesman pliers to do the twisting. It's not a problem that they mash the end of the wire, because you cut that bit off. It's also going to get chewed up when you put the wirenut on and the screw inside it bites into the wires.
(Also, the manufacturers of wirenuts, who have some idea how they work, all say you don't need to pretwist.)

Ive tried pretwisting because " you have yo do it"
It's a useless step imo.
I do twist the wirenut with my kleins until I get some twist in the insulated portion, maybe 1 1/2 or2 twists.
Ive never had one fail yet.
Also if you remove the wirenut you will notice the conductor is actually twisted.

 

[dscheidt]

Ive tried pretwisting because " you have yo do it"
It's a useless step imo.
I do twist the wirenut with my kleins until I get some twist in the insulated portion, maybe 1 1/2 or2 twists.
Ive never had one fail yet.
Also if you remove the wirenut you will notice the conductor is actually twisted.

I don't usually pretwist, because the wire nut does a perfectly fine job by itself. I pretwist when there are a lot of wires, or there's a mix of stranded and solid, because it's easy to screw those up, and pretwisting lets you visually inspect the bundle.

 

[Beerhippie]

If you want to pre-twist your wires, do it right and linemen's work just fine--like they have for many decades:



I'm not sure how your wrists work for twisting wires from the side of the pliers. Mine don't.

 

[mike93lx]

I'll take "solving problems that don't exist" for a thousand, please, Alex

 

[paulsomlo]

I don't usually pretwist, because the wire nut does a perfectly fine job by itself. I pretwist when there are a lot of wires, or there's a mix of stranded and solid, because it's easy to screw those up, and pretwisting lets you visually inspect the bundle.

When there's stranded involved I go to a Wago.

 

[dnschmidt]

If you want to pre-twist your wires, do it right and linemen's work just fine--like they have for many decades:



I'm not sure how your wrists work for twisting wires from the side of the pliers. Mine don't.

I don't think you understand what I'm doing. I am using Linesman's pliers to do the twisting just like you have shown. I'm using the Pliers Wrench to hold the wires that are being twisted so that they don't move around. in short, I'M USING TWO SETS OF PLIERS. I consider wire nuts obsolete anyway as I use Wago's for anything electrical. It's just in this one particular instance where the wire nuts were already there that I decided to try this method.

 

[rlitman]

...I'M USING TWO SETS OF PLIERS...

Interesting. So you're holding a flat fanned out set of wires with the PW. I can picture that working so long as they're all the same gauge. It does have the advantage of fixing the relative locations of the ends of the insulation, so you can keep them perfectly positioned when pre-twisting. Aligning the insulation is always the most difficult skill when it comes to wire nuts, and if this helps you, I say go for it.

 

[dnschmidt]

Interesting. So you're holding a flat fanned out set of wires with the PW. I can picture that working so long as they're all the same gauge. It does have the advantage of fixing the relative locations of the ends of the insulation, so you can keep them perfectly positioned when pre-twisting. Aligning the insulation is always the most difficult skill when it comes to wire nuts, and if this helps you, I say go for it.

Right, and normally they are all the same gauge. In this case that was 12 gauge. It's a way of preventing six inches of twisted wire from the wire nut backwards. Or, rather than being a caveman from the stone age, use a Wago 221 connector and avoid the problem completely. The new Ideal lever nuts are pretty nice as well and have some features the Wago don't but I still prefer the Wago because, for some reason that I consider stupid, Ideal used translucent rather than transparent plastic and it's tougher to see that the wires are completely inserted.

 

[Crazyjake8493]

"Still using wirenuts" implies that they're an inferior product, which they are not.

You also don't need to pre-twist when using wirenuts, per Ideal and other manufacturers. If you do want to pre-twist there's no issues with that, but anyone doing electrical work already has the tool in their bag that does that: linemans pliers

I do love my Knipex pliers wrenches, don't get me wrong. The 7" and 10" I use every single day. They just have no revolutionary purpose in the electrical field.

 

[Bagherra]

When i use wirenuts, i dont' pre-twist...

 

[Beerhippie]

Code here--or rather inspectors here--don't require pre-twisting. They do, however, look to see that the wires are twisted together outside the nut--indicating the nut was tightened down enough to clench all the wires.

I don't pre-twist when connecting two conductors, but do for anything more than that.

 

[dnschmidt]

I've never liked wire nuts. Prior to Wago invading America I used what we called Buchanan connectors which were copper sleeves and nylon caps that fit (actually clicked) over the sleeves. This system used a unique crimping tool that crimped the copper sleeve from four sides with the sleeve placed in the middle of the tool. All the electricians that worked at Westinghouse Electric used this system and when I wired up my shop I stole the idea from them.

 

[KnurledNut]

I've never liked wire nuts. Prior to Wago invading America I used what we called Buchanan connectors which were copper sleeves and nylon caps that fit (actually clicked) over the sleeves. This system used a unique crimping tool that crimped the copper sleeve from four sides with the sleeve placed in the middle of the tool. All the electricians that worked at Westinghouse Electric used this system and when I wired up my shop I stole the idea from them.

I still use these occasionally.

 

[Dick Tracy]

.

 

[JuncleJohn]

My Dad (retired from Bell System) taught me how to twist wires and use wire nuts correctly almost 60 years ago. Strip them long, twist with lineman pliers and use the side cutters to snip off the end before screwing on the wire nuts.
With tiny wires, I’ve even used needle nose with same results. It’s worked flawless for me thousands of times since.

John