Karcher engineering continues to cost money and lost revenue

[mr-gte]

Wieland quick connect plugs used in a wet locations is simply not good.
For karcher it save time testing the machine @ the factory
For the end user Its a nightmare.
This is common to many karcher machines
Wieland Plugs draw moisture and starts to carbon track high voltage to ground. Plugs can corrode causing bad connections .
Today @ 9:25 am karcher stopped...Mid-way through a wash.The car wash waiting line is out to the street After an in depth diagnosis Wieland plug is carbon tracked and shorted out.
Lets see how much its going to cost Joe car wash guy to get running again.
A call is placed for a certified karcher technician to travel to the site for a service call during the weekend.
I am not sure how many days will go by until tech arrives?lets assume tech comes right away
Travel time is a round trip visit = 340.00
Diagnosis and repair machine @ 90.00 per hour
during the week.Weekends I don't know the hourly rate.Lets assume its 90.00
I took me 5 hours to
Diagnosis and repair machine
450.00
plug parts
280.00

340.00 travel
450.00 labor
280.00 parts
389.00 loss of revenues
1459.00 total cost for this one plug to be used on the machine.
You will need to budget money to replace all the plugs every 3-5 years.
Or you could replace machine with another brand for 130,000-175,000.00

 

[ted mcmeekin]

I know nothing about this machine. Why not just rewire and eliminate the plugs?
I expect that is a real pain but may be worthi it in long run.
Good luck ,

Ted

 

[mr-gte]

Ted
Great question
Its can be done
There is 9 of these plugs with about 300 plus wires.
Any Idea's how much this will cost?Wow
Another nightmare

 

[MEP001]

The plugs themselves aren't very expensive. I believe their design is more for explosion-proofing than waterproofing given that they're mostly steel and zinc. If there's not a need to unplug them later, can't you just remove them and splice the wiring directly together?

 

[Gabriel]

I would just seal off the plugs like the telephone company and electrical companies do when they have lines cut underground. It is a nasty glue glob of crap that makes a permanent seal. If you are not unplugging them and they have to be rewired if corrosion and moisture set in why not just seal them off completely.

 

[Randy]

From the amount that you?re being charged for repairing these plugs I can see why Karcher is using them. They are big money maker for the distributor/service tech?s. Years ago I worked for the Navy and we used a lot of Cannon plugs. When ever we made up connection outside we would use Die-electric grease on the inside of the plug, coat the outside of the plug with a generous amount of silicone, slip a piece of shrink tubing over the plug and heat it to shrink the tubing until it shrunk around the plug as the excess silicone oozed out of the ends. I don't recall ever having a problem with one.

 

[mr-gte]

My thoughts, Karcher as a(Manufacture) should step up, an address many machine issue's associated with their equipment..Karcher and ICS has an open invitation to participate on the forum.Currently Karcher / ICS have chosen not to.
Plugs
An UL / ETL desgin solution is needed to eliminate the plugs in the field
This repair done correctly Is very expensive and time consuming requiring days of down time.
Can someone provide a unbiased cost quote?
Allways Make sure your own repairs are certifiable

 

[ted mcmeekin]

Good point. If I owned this company I would send out large heat shrink packages to all owners. Unplug, slip on heat shrink and carefully heat. I would of course clean or use contact solvent on connectors first. Customers would have a solution and Karcher would get terrific customer service testimonials.

It is always fun to think of solutions to problems when they are not yours. Anyway good luck.

Ted

 

[MEP001]

The large plug shown on the right wouldn't be easy to seal. It's about 5" across. Perhaps replacing it with a Molex connector and covering that with heat shrink tubing would suffice - the tubing could be slit and replaced if the plug needs to be used during service.

 

[mac]

The tip about the dielectric grease is a very good one. Instead of heat shrink tubing, you can also use liquid electrical tape. Comes in a can like pvc glue and brushes on. Seals up wire nuts very well also. We use it a lot. It is a shame the silly amnufacturers don't do this when the thing is built. Maybe even use a little Never Sieze and stainless hardware. Wait a minute, I must be dreaming.

 

[carwash1]

i think karcher needs to address this problem ASAP

 

[mac]

While, yes, Karcher should address this, my guess is they won't. It's been like this for about three years, maybe longer.

 

[carwash1]

i have a collection of these plugs iv saved and im trying to post pictures of them

i cant get the image sizes small enough

 

[MEP001]

i cant get the image sizes small enough

Host them on an external site, such as www.imageshack.us, then just copy and paste the hotlink to forums text into a new post.

 

[petitemoose]

The easiest future prevention tip I can give you will cost you about $20. Go get two tubes of DiElectric grease. Take the plugs apart and fill both sides as best you can then re-connect. Smear the excess around the outside and into the grooves. Repeat on the next plug. This will prevent the situation you are describing in the future while allowing easy separation and minimize corossion.

 

[mr-gte]

Male and female plug connections have dielectric grease on them. This connection is not where the plugs fail.
The problem is from condensation in the sections of the plugs' hard wiring. Once condensation is present, Galvanic corrosion starts creating a white powder build up. After enough powder builds up, 480 voltage is able to carbon track to ground causing the plugs' hard wiring to burn and short out. This is a very, very dangerous condition. The plug design is poor thinking and should have never been used in this environment.
I believe the only reason these plugs were used was to save machine testing time at the factory.
Andy would I be correct on this?