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Old 3rd Mar 2018, 9:36 am   #4
G6Tanuki
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Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Wiltshire, UK.
Posts: 13,953
Default Re: Repairing a mains voltage heating element

At my late parents house they had in the bathroom one of the 'classic' electric heaters - the type with a coiled heating element inside a silica tube about three feet long. When the element failed I couldn't easily get a replacement [the local electrical repairs shop said it was obsolete, had to take their word for it because this was a time pre-Google and pre-Ebay] so I took the ceramic end-caps off, extracted the broken element from inside and straightened-out an inch or so of the coiled element ech side of the break and used the innards from a 5-amp 'choc-block' connector to join them. I had to grind off the protruding screw-heads to get it to fit back inside the silica tube but it worked just fine for another ten years or so.

I figured that though a total 'bodge' it was a relatively safe bodge since if it did come apart the tension in the coiled element would pull the ends away from each other reducing the risk of a sustained arc, and anyway it was all contained in the silica tube.
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