What Wire Connector is the Best? Settling a Debate! Wire Nut VS Wago

From time to time I do electrical house wiring and what is always right beside me while doing that are of course my tools, some spare wire and of course a box with different Wago connectors. Those connectors are pretty much the standard here in Germany when it comes to connecting wires; no matter if it comes to DIY projects or house wiring. Every electrician I personally know including me loves using them. But when having a look at other parts of the world and with that I primarily mean the USA then Wago connectors are not the standard but instead such wire nuts which I never used before. So in this video I want to find a definitive answer which connector is the best and don't worry there will be lots of objective tests included which means my love for Wago connectors will not influence the final result. Let's get started! This video is sponsored by Skillshare which is an online learning community with thousands of inspiring and useful classes. I first got interested in Skillshare when I was looking for more in depth videos about electrical power engineering and found the videos from Ahmed Mahdy there which offers a nice collection of them. And that was the moment I joined. So today I want to recommend his class Ultimate 2021 Solar Energy course for electrical engineering which not only comes with tons of useful information but also a pleasing presentation. If you want to watch it or one of the other classes on Skillshare then feel free to click the link in the video description because the first 1000 subscribers of mine who do so will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare. To start things off I got myself a new kit with different kinds of Wago connectors and of course one with different kinds of wire nuts which by the way you can both easily get from Amazon even here in Germany. And what I did next was preparing different kinds and sizes of wires for connecting and then tried out most of the connectors I got with them while coming up with a list of comparison criteria which are most important to me. So here is my list of them and there can only be one winner for each category. But before starting off, let me tell you that wire nuts work with solid core conductors as well as stranded wires which the Wago 221 can also both handle. But the other popular kind of Wago connectors, the 2273 does only accept solid core conductors which is why I initially wanted to eliminate them from this comparison but since I use them so often I just had to keep them in. And with that out of the way let's start with ease of use. To find a winner let's imagine I hand you these 3 connectors. The first thing you would probably do is taking a closer look at each and soon after you would realize that there are tons of information available on the Wago 221. Not only does it tell you how much insulation you have to remove but also what conductor cross section it works with and voltage and current it is rated for. The other Wago connector tells you a little bit less with the current and voltage rating missing and the wire nut basically tell you nothing. Now granted the Wago ones also don't tell you what kind of wire type they support but other than that they come with lots of crucial information. For Wire nuts however you have to dig through the internet to find out how many wires of which size fit into one of the different coloured wire nuts and what voltage they are rated for. But what I couldn't find was a current rating along with a recommendation on how much insulation to remove. But by going with my guts, I stripped off around 10mm of insulation, placed the allowed amount of wires inside a nut and simply started twisting until it was all nicely secured which all in all was pretty intuitive to do. If we remove the plastic housing we can see how a metal thread bites into the metals and thus not only keeps the wires tight together but also connects them electrically. Now using the Wago 2273 is even more straightforward by simply removing the insulation and pushing one conductor in each hole and that's it. If we remove its plastic housing which was harder to do than I thought we can see that it uses metal springs to hold the conductors in place and push them onto a bus bar. And last but not least we got the Wago 221 which like the 2273 is super intuitive to use and its functional principle is also similar and only differs by including a lever mechanism. And with the first usage tests completed I have to give the first point to Wago because you don't have to google anything, they are more self explanatory and I feel like pushing wires into something is way easier to do overhead in comparison to twisting wires together. Next we come to possible problems and for that I want you to imagine that we want to connect this light fixture that comes with stranded wires with a solid core conductor using a wire nut. Just like shown before that should be pretty easy to pull off and after removing the wire nut it seems like the connection was pretty well done. But during a later test I had to do such a mixed wire type connection again and there you can see that the connection turned out not so good. Now the main problem for me here is that wire nuts are not see through so you can never truly confirm whether your connection is as good as it can be. Wago connectors on the other hand are see through and you can always double check if your conductor is in the right spot which is why Wago gets an extra point here. But moving on; next I want to see how fast I can use the connectors because time is money and as an example I will wire up a light. For the Wago contender I only went with the 221 version which due to its push in and lever functionality was super fast to use and I finished this job in under one minute. On the other hand we got the wire nuts which due to their long twisting times were way slower to use and thus I needed around the double amount of time which means point goes to Wago. Next is reusability because sometimes you want to change your house installation and of course it is not hard to see that Wago 221 is reusable. The 2273 kind is also reusable by simply twisting the wires while pulling them out. Wire nuts do come off as well and theoretically can be reused but since there is a lot of debate about that on the internet I have to say that this point also goes to Wago. Next we got the size aspect because distribution boxes are small and thus we want our connectors to be as small as possible as well. Now because of the available sizes of connectors and what cross section of conductor and how many they can hold; I would say that this is a tie meaning both get a point. So moving on the often very important price point and here I have to say that after doing research on USA and Germany based websites it seems like the wire nuts are at least 4 to 5 times cheaper than Wago connectors which means point goes to them. Next we come to the pull test which is important because inside a junction box or similar the connectors are pretty much always under a bit of tension and they need to be able to withstand that. So I used my mini crane scale and a pretty rudimentary test setup too see what forces the wire nut can withstand and it seems like more than I can pull which was around 30kg. I then did the same test with the Wago 2273 which also survived my brute force. Only the Wago 221 gave up at around 20kg which is still more than enough for all electrical tasks but since there can only be one winner; it is this time the wire nut. Next we come to the resistance test because the lower the contact resistance of a connector is the less power losses gets produced and thus the connector stays cool which is favourable in order to avoid fires. So to measure the resistance I prepared 6 conductors with the same length of which always two I put together with a connector. Then I used a power supply to pump 20A through the test setups and measured the complete voltage drop across them. Now of course here we are including the wire resistance as well but we can easily measure that beforehand and then subtract it. And after completing all the tests it seems like the wire nut comes with the lowest resistance, followed by the Wago 2273 and then the Wago 221 which with a resistance of 2.2mohm almost creates a power loss of 1W. You can definitely feel that heat when touching and see it through a thermal imaging camera while the other two connectors basically stayed at room temperature with 20A flowing through them. So once again while all the connector resistances work perfectly fine for electrical tasks, the wire nut once again won this test. And last but not least it was time for the flammable test in which I used my heat gun to basically melt the connectors while observing whether they are capable of creating some kind of fire and it seems like none of them do that which means a point for both. And with all the important tests being completed it seems like it was a narrow victory for the Wago connector which it really wasn't for me though because in the categories the wire nut won the Wago one also performed excellent, just not as good. Only if you are looking for a super cheap wire connector option I would recommend wire nuts but for everything else I will stick with my trusty Wago connectors. And with that being said thanks for watching. If you enjoyed the video and want to see more then consider supporting me through Patreon. Don't forget to like, share, subscribe and hit the notification bell. Stay creative and I will see you next time.

Channel: GreatScott!

Views: 1,922,052

Keywords: wago, terminal, block, wire, nut, connector, house, wiring, electrical, electronics, electronic, cable, conductor, stranded, solid, core, awg, cross, section, current, voltage, heat, price, size, compare, comparison, ease, of, use, problem, problems, possible, germany, usa, united, states, america, fast, speed, usage, reusability, guide, beginner, beginners, how, to, make, pull, test, resistance, resistor, flammable, greatscott, greatscott!, project, explain

Id: zgjo36-jaFY

Length: 11min 8sec (668 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 13 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/guthixslays]

I’m a big fan of the lever nuts and would use them over wire nuts if my supply houses stocked them. But also wanted to point out he’s using low quality wire nuts in the video. I only use quality 3Ms.

[u/Treats4youtofoget]

He didn't lead the stranded wire in the wire nut. You always have to lead the stranded! Understandable because he has never used one.

[u/cereallkiller17]

I stopped watching when the guy twisted the wire with his hands. Clearly don’t know how to use a wirenut and how to twist wire. It’s the copper you twist,not the whole cable.

[u/Fogl3]

An important point to note is that with a price difference is also a speed difference. So even though the wire nuts are cheaper the wagos are so much faster that it's cheaper overall

[u/pepsioverall]

I really enjoy the reuse-ability of the 221 but the resistance test really makes me think twice about ditching wire-nuts for wago 221s.

[u/robstoon]

I've seen some other videos about this that came to similar conclusions. Wagos seem fine for things like light fixtures that use stranded wire which is a PITA to use wire nuts with. I'm less convinced that they are good idea on circuits with sustained heavy loads due to the higher resistance.

[u/Careless-Statement39]

Short answer: tan Ideal wirenuts