Looking for reasonably good but inexpensive crimper tool - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / beginners

author: eeguy
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 12:37:05 am
content: Hi, I am looking for crimper tool for 16AWG MINI-FIT JR but it costs hundreds of dollars. Why it is so expensive? What is the different between 16AWG MINI-FIT JR and just 16AWG wires? Will cheaper crimper tool for standard 16AWG wires be good enough to get the job done?

author: cdev
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 12:44:43 am
content: I just saw this huge thread on this here, which had a link to a huge article about it.https://www.eevblog.com/forum/reviews/affordable-crimp-tools-for-small-connectors-(dupont-etc-)/msg3095520/#new

author: MosherIV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 07:30:26 am
content: Check out Bigclive's video on crmp tools

author: Phil-GS
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 09:07:49 am
content: The price of crimping tools from the likes on AMP has always been eye-watering and unjustified.You could run up a bill of thousands GBP for bog standard crimpers.That all changed when cheap Far Eastern stuff came in, but large, say, telecom companies with deep pockets will always use the manufacturers recommended tools.I bought a cheepo pair of crimps for Molex KK terminals under the name of "Engineer". A tenth of the price of the Molex item. made in Japan, nice quality and as a bonus, it does JST terminals as well.

author: wizard69
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 01:20:37 pm
content: Quote from: eeguy on June 18, 2020, 12:37:05 amBecause they can!While that is true the other reality is that you are buying tools that are made in low volume. Consider the cost of crimpers for ring terminals used by electricians. A crimper that is widely used for say 10 awg and under wire is cheap, try buying a crimper for 4 awg and you pay big bucks. Low volume tools can not compete with high volume tools price wise. Beyond that the materials the tools are constructed from are often different, tools built from tool steel with hardened and ground bits and pieces will never be as cheap as something stamped out of a press.QuoteMy experience is that cheap crimpers for these types of connectors don't always cut the mustard. YOu can find cheaper crimpers but unless you have somebody with experience that can comment on them you are gambling that they will work right. I'm not sure what prices you are seeing but a "Service Grade" crimper from Molex can be had for about $140. that is a lot better than the $300 - $400 you can pay for the better crimpers. You can also look for third party crimpers and hope for the best.

author: Phil-GS
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: June 18, 2020, 01:42:18 pm
content: The other reason that they are expensive is that might be used on high-end items like Boeing airliners.If the work has to be certified, then no manufacturer is going to risk a lawsuit traced back to a dodgy crimp and that sort of guarantee ups the price.Really cheap crimpers for crimps like red blue yellow terminals aren't worth buying and your hands will soon tell you that.I have a cheapish but solid ratchet blue etc crimper for less than 20 GBP and it works really well - came from an electrical wholesaler.The bottom line is who has to foot the bill.If the customer pays in the long term, then buy the Molex - it will always have a good resale value.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 20, 2020, 01:22:27 pm
content: Quote from: eeguy on June 18, 2020, 12:37:05 am1. because good crimp tools, especially those for smaller contacts, require the combination of high precision and high (but highly controlled) force.2. because they can: for non-hobby use, the reliability of the real tool makes its cost insignificant compared to the cost of fixing problems caused by bad crimps.Quote from: eeguy on June 18, 2020, 12:37:05 amWhat do you mean here? One is a connector, one is a kind of wire.Quote from: eeguy on June 18, 2020, 12:37:05 amThere’s no such thing as a standard crimper for a particular wire size. There are standard crimpers for generic terminals of specific sizes. (Though this is not as good as using name-brand terminals with the official tool.) But even these need to match the kind of terminal. The biggest 4 kinds (by my own reckoning) are:- open-barrel (where wings close in on the wire and insulation)- closed barrel (where the wire goes in a tube which is squeezed around the wire)- insulated closed barrel (same, but with insulation on the barrel, which gets squeezed together with the metal and wire inside)- what I’ll call “premium” machined closed barrel, like Deutsch and military/aerospace connectors, where the wire goes in a tube which is open on one end only, and instead of being squeezed, 4 or 8 pins squeeze precision indents into the tube.The crimpers for these terminals are not interchangeable, even for the same wire size.And that’s before getting into the product-specific tooling like you’re talking about. It’s been tweaked to optimize for many factors. In my own expermentation with various crimp contact and tool compatibility, I think the following are critical dimensions directly affecting basic compatibility:- jaw width/height (as in the cross-section of the crimped terminal) — too small crushes the contact and causes fractures in the metals, too large and the crimp will be too loose. Note that a crimper has two different jaw heights/widths (and sometimes, shapes), one for the stripped wire contact area, and one for the insulation crimp.- jaw thickness (as in, length along the wire) — too thick and you also crush the contact area and/or damage the insulation- wire gauge- contact thickness (as in, how thick is the sheet metal the contact crimp area is made from). Thinner contacts need smaller, more precise jaws than thicker ones. But of course it’s often the cheap generic contacts that are made thinner...And these then all interact with the force needs. A first-party tool will have optimized all these things (and likely more) to produce optimal crimps without needing to screw around.Now, with that said, for non-critical applications and hobby use, you can certainly get away with using the “wrong” or generic tool, provided the 4 dimensions I listed above are more or less correct.IMHO, one of the biggest problems is that many contact types need thinner jaws than the generic tools have. For example, the super-common SN-28B crimper sold online for “DuPont” pins is actually for 2.8mm Faston terminals, which have a crimp area of about 6 or 7mm (about half for wire, half for insulation), so the jaws are 7mm thick, which is already too thick for some terminals. (The wire terminal should actually be slightly shorter than the wire crimp area, so that it creates a flared opening that doesn’t stress the wire.) But DuPont type contacts have a crimp area of 4mm at most (less on many!), such that with a 7mm thick jaw, you end up at minimum crimping the gap between crimp area and the actual contact area itself, reducing its rigidity. And the insulation jaw is the wrong shape for the wrap-around insulation crimp wings.I looked at the drawing of the Mini-Fit Jr. contacts, and the crimp area is 4mm long, so nearly every cheap crimp tool is going to be wrong for it. However, the Toozo TZ-4228B that I mention in my recent thread (the one cdev linked above) actually expressly says its third jaw is for “ATX power” pins, which are Mini-Fit Jr. And indeed, that jaw is 4mm thick. Given that crimper’s low price, decent quality, and that so far, it’s worked well for every contact I’ve tried on it (all ones it claims to support), I’d give it a try. The link to the seller is in the first post there.