I finally figured out why my crimps kept failing on armored cable

After 12 years in the field, I always blamed bad connectors when BX cable terminations would pull loose. Last month I got a call back on a job in Portland, so I sat down and watched a master electrician strip a section by hand. He showed me how the armor spiral had to be cut at a 35 degree angle, not straight across, or the inner wire would bind under the clamp. I checked my old work and sure enough, every failed crimp was on a straight cut. Has anyone else run into this, or am I the last guy to learn it the hard way?

1 comments

Log in to join the discussion

Log In

1 Comment

kevin_dixon1mo ago

Could be the bending radius around the connector, not just the cut angle.

4