Power Cord Colour Code

Thread Starter

blah2222

Joined May 3, 2010
582
Hi, I bought myself a jumper cable to connect to mains to power my power supply but I came across an extra wire that I was unfamiliar with and was hoping someone could lend a hand.

I live in Canada and I was expecting a different colour code scheme than what was present in this Longwell jumper but it seems like this is IEC standard?

I got out my multimeter and checked and it seems as though the silver wire is connected to the green/yellow wire.

Green/Yellow = Earth
Brown = Hot
Blue = Neutral
Silver = Earth (what is this wire needed for?)

Attached is a picture of the cord opened up. Any help is much appreciated.

Thanks,
JP
 

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KnRele

Joined Jan 7, 2013
20
It looks like it could be some sort of shielding. Is there just the bare wire, or is there some kind of foil screen around the three insulated conductors? I've seen something similar used for the cable between the power switch and the power supply in some computers; in those cases the cable had 4 cores and a screen.

The Blue being the Neutral and Brown being the Live or Hot is a common standard that is seen all over Europe, so the plug at the other end is correctly wired.

I think you can get by by connecting the bare wire to the Earth terminal together with the yellow/green, and cover the exposed length of the bare wire with heatshrink tubing to protect it.
 

Thread Starter

blah2222

Joined May 3, 2010
582
It looks like it could be some sort of shielding. Is there just the bare wire, or is there some kind of foil screen around the three insulated conductors? I've seen something similar used for the cable between the power switch and the power supply in some computers; in those cases the cable had 4 cores and a screen.

The Blue being the Neutral and Brown being the Live or Hot is a common standard that is seen all over Europe, so the plug at the other end is correctly wired.

I think you can get by by connecting the bare wire to the Earth terminal together with the yellow/green, and cover the exposed length of the bare wire with heatshrink tubing to protect it.
Yep, there was foil and what looked like strands of fibreglass insulation around the three insulated wires. The silver wire was bare.

The silver wire seems to be called an "internal uninsulated earth wire". Not really sure what its use is though if there is already an insulated green/yellow earth wire...
 
Last edited:

KnRele

Joined Jan 7, 2013
20
The yellow/green wire is the Protective Earth, while this bare one connects to the shield in the cable, likely in order to help keep noise from leaking in or out. This latter will not be required to carry any fault current.
 

Thread Starter

blah2222

Joined May 3, 2010
582
The yellow/green wire is the Protective Earth, while this bare one connects to the shield in the cable, likely in order to help keep noise from leaking in or out. This latter will not be required to carry any fault current.
I see, I guess it would make sense to just solder it back to protective ground then.

Thanks!
 
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