@NightCreeper, @Wooter600333642, If you take a look at my images of the disassembled unit you’ll see that it is AN INHERENT DESIGN FLAW that these present reversed polarity to half of the available sockets. It is literally impossible for the problem to not be present in each and every unit of these models sold - it is a physical design characteristic, not an accidental mis-wring. Second, such wiring will not prevent the units from “working” when all is sunny and good - that is the nature of AC power. HOWEVER, what you and we own is an outlet adapter that can become DANGEROUS AND PERHAPS LETHAL should a defective or faulty appliance be plugged into it. It may work well for you for years until it doesn’t and you get the shock of your lifetime. They are unsafe and not legal for use or sale in the US.
I am a diploma’d Electrical Engineer by trade. I’d be interested in hearing your expertise in this area if you still feel as if we are incorrect in our assessment of this issue.
Please go to the following link to file a formal claim with ETL parent Intertek as I have done. These are marked with an ETL certification, but either this is bogus or a serious oversight occurred during testing. These need to be taken off the market.
LMAO!!! I don’t need to be an Electrical Engineer or even know much of anything about even being an electrician to know how to test my purchases for hot and neutral wires. Hilarious.
When I state that mine “work”, I mean that all 12 outlets test just fine. Both of the 12s I have purchased are just fine. So, your claim that “all of these devices have an inherent design flaw” isn’t the truth. Sorry, but that’s the case. My background doesn’t change any of that.
You seem to be adamant that you’re correct regarding this product whenever it appears here. If you have that need, so be it. But, I can only state that you’re wrong when it comes to the 2 12s that I own. End of story.
@NightCreeper believe what you will, and I hope you don’t get shocked as a result of plugging in a device exposing you to the hot leg. Once again, if you are at all interested, please look at my disassembled image. The internals include the equivalent of L-shaped buss bars to distribute each leg to the front and side outlets. Based on this design it is PHYSICALLY impossible not to have the outlets reversed from front to side as they would have to cross each other to avoid the issue.
Any chance that the ground socket on your side outlets are oriented 180° different from the front (meaning on top rather than bottom)? Open yours if you’re willing (only a couple of screws) and take a picture. I’d love to see visual evidence of a unit that doesn’t exhibit the problem.
Bought one, pulled out ohm meter, checked neutral on front = 0.01 ohm to hot on side, and OL (FLUKE 87 display for an open circuit) to the neutral on the side. Contacted WOOT! customer service and they are refunding order. So while NightCreeper may not need to be an Electrical Engineer or “need to know electricity in order to test my purchase” I have to wonder if the manufacturer made his special, made yours and mine special, or he simply never checked (or he has some other Aduro item, as I have several products from them that are similar but on inspection are made with WIRES and they are connected correctly). But I agree with Wooter600333642 who said, JUST DON’T BUY IT.
Oh, and thanks for the info, I might never have looked otherwise. Aduro is no small “fly by night” company so I am a bit surprised this got past them.
NightCreeper: Can you clarify what you mean when you say your units “work.” Do you mean that when you plug stuff into the twelve outlets, all of the outlets succeed in powering up what you plug in? Or have you also tested the wiring and found that yours are properly wired and grounded? If the latter, can you please explain how you tested?
I had already clarified my use of the word “work”. Was pretty clear.
There it is, once again. So, I’m done discussing this product. Buy it or don’t buy it. It’s your choice. I stated my experience with the product clearly enough already.
And I couldn’t care less if you believe me or not. It’s not my job to make you believe me. I know my product is built correctly. And that’s all that matters. People can make up their own minds about buying the product. It’s pretty pathetic that you need to turn to very weak sarcasm when someone disagrees with your assessments. I’m done with you.
I think he doesn’t really understand the issue. The method he chose is very roundabout and not directly applicable to this unit. It is sooooo much easier to use a continuity tester or even a just plug a ground-fault tester into the outlets. The fact that he had to go to a web page to explain to him now to “test” the outlets pretty much tells us that he doesn’t really know what he’s talking about. So does his claim that he “very clearly” explained what he meant. The guy doesn’t understand electricity. Period.
FYI, I simply used the webpage to explain how I actually used my multimeter to test the product. I didn’t need the webpage to tell me how to do so. And the testing process is perfectly capable of determining what’s needed in this case. If my specific product was “defective”, as djsteve adamantly states, then this process used would have shown that. And, again, in my case it didn’t. Simple as that. So, don’t make assumptions when it’s clearly you who doesn’t understand what you’re talking about.
Again, that method is not the correct one to determine this problem with this unit. Trust me – many years experience with electronics and electricity, including studying EE in college (but changed my major to physics).
Do yourself a favor – spend less than $10 for a ground-fault detector and plug it into each outlet. Or use your multimeter, but use it as a continuity tester, not as a voltmeter and see which contacts in the outlets are connected to which outlets on the plug. (Just in case: the unit should not be plugged into the wall when you do this!)
It’s entirely possible that the error in these units has been corrected, but I doubt it. Just look at the internal design (see image above).
Note to pepper: Please check out Nightcreeper’s posting (maybe his first?) from 9 days ago before you start accusing others of anything resembling “bullying.” There are three of us here (one a bona fide EE, me with EE background but changed majors), and one other who obviously know his stuff, raising this issue. And one guy who has a hazy at best understanding of the issue, posting “LMAO” at us and mocking our expertise, which he obviously lacks. Who’s the bully here?)
Locking this thread will only potentially add to additional culpability on Woot’s part. These units CONTINUE being sold in other site listings (despite claims to the contrary) and this consumer safety information/discussion is critical to remain open.
If anyone purchased this item and has an issue they need to contact customer service. The item attached to this forum is sold out and no longer available through the link at the top. Should it become available there will be a new forum link provided in the sale listing and your concerns may be voiced there.
You can still access all the information provided by users even when a thread is closed.
It’s even worse – in an attempt to provide irrefutable visual info, I grabbed my ground-fault tester and checked every outlet on the unit. When @djsteve1 first posted on this matter, I verified that the N and H leads were swapped in half of the outlets. But I ASSumed that the grounds were all correct, so I never bothered to test that. Lo and behold, half the outlets are entirely ungrounded! There are only three properly wired outlets out of twelve. I double checked this with a continuity tester, and confirmed the error.
I don’t need to be an Electrical Engineer or even know much of anything about even being an electrician to know how to test my purchases for hot and neutral wires. Hilarious.
