photo #2643882

Safety As we wrote each post we briefly talked about safety issues and the inherited risk of injury or accidents working with electricity and its components. Here we will be a bit more specific and engaged on safety handling. When working with electrical components there are a few rules that you should always take into account. 1) wear safety glasses. Believe it or not a simple spark can expel tiny bits of metal and these could get into your eyes. 2) Always take any rings or jewelry you wear on your hands. 3) do not wear dangling necklaces make of metal that can easily, accidentally cause a short. 4) Always know where a ABC Fire extinguisher is and keep it close by. 5) Always disconnect the battery before working on live components. Our projects, if followed all have a master on/off switch make sure it is off. It is also best to disconnect one of the battery terminals and make sure you isolate the loose terminal end by wrapping in plastic ect so it will not short out. The second is a must do if no master switch is in existence. 6) if you did not add a master switch to turn off the power and you are adding or exchanging a inverter connect one to the battery and take the other and place inline a ceramic resister and hold it to the battery for a minute or two. These inverters usually have large capacitors that if not pre-charged will cause a spark. Most of the time no harm will occur to the inverter or battery but it could damage it. It really will make you jump however, and as like we said if not wearing safety glasses it could thrust small pieces of metal into your eyes. 7) When using metal tools, such as screw drivers make sure you insulate the majority of the metal before you start using it inside the component and wire area. Take some electrical tape and wrap the stem of the screw driver, for example to insulate it from shorting out. All it will take is a small error, a slip of the screwdriver blade to have an accidental shorting of a connection. Once again, best scenario is to disconnect the power before working on the project. 😎 in our projects we have always tried to be sure to use color coding of our wire. Black for negative and red for positive. Pay attention if using a volt or amp meter that you do not cause a short. Always touch the red probe to a red wire or connection as well as the black probe to the negative connection. 9) Depending on battery chemistry, always work in a dry cool place. If using a lead acid battery do not dump it upside down because the acid and chemicals inside could spill out and cause skin burns or hurt your eyes if not wearing safety glasses. 10) If you remember several years ago when lithium batteries were exploding -- sometimes for no apparent reason. If a fire does happen or you see smoke move away quickly and be prepared with a fire extinguisher. Do not go back to it until you are absolutely sure that it is extinguished. 11) If using a drill always make sure the chuck is tightened adequately. Never put your fingers into the wire strippers or wire cutters, they are sharp and could cause injury. If using wire strippers always wear safety glasses as well since the tiny piece of insulation could or will go flying and usually it contains tiny fragments of loose cut wire. I have no doubt that I will be adding more to this list as time goes by