I've been working with electrical circuits as a DIYer for years, including electronics and powerline work. But one thing I always feel like I do a terrible job at is stripping wires: both the outside jacket and the insulators from the conductors…
Perhaps I'm being over paranoid, but if I nick the insulators when I'm cutting the jacket, or if I nick or scrape the insulator I will cut back past this injury and start over. I want something that an inspector would give the thumbs up, because I might as well do it right while I'm doing it. But, this always tends to take a while to cut just through the insulator and not any further. I've tried tools from knives to sharp wire cutters to duller wire cutters to specific wire strippers.
My current mechanism is to just use a knife and be extremely careful while cutting the insulation or jacket, but it is fairly time-consuming and error-prone. Some jackets I get lucky on and there is a ground or nylon string in it that I can pull on to tear the jacket up to where I need it, then just clip it off. But some appliance cords that I work on have quite beefy 20A cables and those can be a bear.
Any hints or words of wisdom on what an inspector would red-flag me on?
Best Answer
First up, the only "right" way is to do so with the cable disconnected from the power and to do so without nicking the conductors. Beyond that there are a multitude of ways, with some being better than others on certain kinds of cable.
As an apprentice I was taught to use either pliers or a knife, depending on the cable, and have continued to do it that way ever since (about 42 years). Sure I've had to redo a cable from time to time because I nicked the conductor but I reckon that once I had the technique mastered that would be no more than one or two in a thousand cables.
Over time I've tried just about every kind of gadget and in general am less than impressed with most. Even those which worked well at first seem to deteriorate and become useless as either their cutters get blunt or they develop too mush slop in the moving parts.
Despite the forgoing, I suggest a person with an occasional need to strip cables use a commercial stripper. However, a person with a more regular need just needs to learn a couple of tricks (needs to be shown, not described in words) and practice. Just one thing to remember, pliers with sharp cutters work better than those with blunt cutters, and are also less forgiving of mistakes. Side cutters for some reason never work as well.