There seem to be a zillion pitfalls out there just waiting to entrap the unwary buyer.\u00a0 Take for instance my dilemma.<\/p>\n
The bozo at work borrowed the Brother P-Touch labeler and brought it back without the AC adapter – apparently he lost it.\u00a0 So we put eight AA cells in the battery holder and it has been running on those for a short while.\u00a0 But they got a whole big box full of fiber optic patch cords, probably more than a hundred, and these had to be labeled sequentially, 1 through 100 or more, with the same number on a label on each end.\u00a0 We got through most of the job, but then the AA cells were giving out, they were just about dead.\u00a0 Well, I’m not going to go out and buy 8 AA cells, probably for more than ten dollars U.S., because I can buy a new AC adapter for less than ten dollars on eBay.\u00a0 So I found a P-Touch labeler in another department, and got the information from its AC adapter.\u00a0 It said, in part:<\/p>\n
Brother Switching Adapter Model AD-24<\/p>\n
9VDC 1.6 Amps Output, 100 – 240 VAC input<\/p>\n
Polarity:\u00a0 Center contact is Negative (this is important!!)<\/p>\n
So I got on eBay and searched or Brother AD-24 Adapter and came up with many sellers, some selling it for less than 6 dollars, many with free shipping.\u00a0 One of them looked promising, even though it didn’t look like the original.\u00a0 I examined the pictures, and found that it was center contact positive<\/span>, backwards from the original.\u00a0 If this one was used in the labeler, it would most likely damage the labeler, and would not work in any case.<\/p>\n I started looking through others, and found that either they didn’t show the polarity, or the polarity was wrong, which obviously is unacceptable, because the wrong polarity could damage the labeler.\u00a0 I did find a few that looked exactly like\u00a0 the original, and had the Brother name on the label, but generally these were twenty dollars or more with shipping.<\/p>\n Right now, the clueless sellers who are representing that their adapters are suitable as substitutes are creating a dangerous situation where the uninformed buyer is almost certain to damage their equipment.\u00a0 I think that eBay should require the AC adapter sellers to have a link in their web page that warns the seller about this dangerous situation.\u00a0 This should apply to all adapters, not just those for labelers.\u00a0 This warning should also apply to any replacement device that may have a potential to damage the equipment.\u00a0 This is VERY IMPORTANT: The damage could be so severe that the equipment might not be repairable and the equipment could cost hundreds or thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n Another piece<\/strong> of information that the buyers should be made aware of is the “Efficiency Level” that is also on the adapter’s label.\u00a0 I did a web search and came up with this document<\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0 I will have to do a lot more reading about this before I get a good understanding of what it means.\u00a0 But from the articles I have read, I can say this much: if the replacement power supply is lower efficiency than the original, it could cost you more for your electric bill.\u00a0 These “wall warts” are usually left plugged in 24\/7, so if they waste power even though the equipment is not turned on, then this can add up to a substantial amount and affect your electric bill.\u00a0 It would be helpful if the consumer chose a replacement that is at least as efficient as the original.<\/p>\n There is one other point that may be unimportant in a low power device such as a labeler or battery charger, but gets more important as\u00a0 the power get higher.\u00a0 Most of the power that is wasted in the AC adapter appears as heat that escapes out to the ambient air.\u00a0 This heat may have to be removed from the ambient air by an air conditioner, so you pay more than once for the wasted heat.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There seem to be a zillion pitfalls out there just waiting to entrap the unwary buyer.\u00a0 Take for instance my dilemma. The bozo at work borrowed the Brother P-Touch labeler and brought it back without the AC adapter – apparently he lost it.\u00a0 So we put eight AA cells in the battery holder and it <\/p>\n (Read More…)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,129],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-power-supplies","category-security-and-safety"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7721"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7725,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7721\/revisions\/7725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rustybolt.info\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}