I always design things assuming the user is a complete idiot. This is mostly since I know what I can be like on a bad day.
I recently saw the results of someone else not following this. It cooked a £30k piece of kit, and almost completely scuppered the job. I had even explicitly warned them that the wiring was a danger. “No one would be stupid enough to plug it in like that.” 6 weeks later…
They ended up with a gender bender cable. It was supposed to always stay attached to 1 bit of kit. That kit could run on 7-48V. Unfortunately, they unplugged it from the wrong end. When they plugged it back in, they put it into the 2nd power source connector. A 28V lipo was wired directly into a regulated 12V bus. That bus apparently was also connected to internal parts, and wasn’t protected against backflow (defence in depth failure). Magic smoke was lost.
I always design things assuming the user is a complete idiot. This is mostly since I know what I can be like on a bad day.
I recently saw the results of someone else not following this. It cooked a £30k piece of kit, and almost completely scuppered the job. I had even explicitly warned them that the wiring was a danger. “No one would be stupid enough to plug it in like that.” 6 weeks later…
Did they use the same style and gender of connector for both power and signal?
They ended up with a gender bender cable. It was supposed to always stay attached to 1 bit of kit. That kit could run on 7-48V. Unfortunately, they unplugged it from the wrong end. When they plugged it back in, they put it into the 2nd power source connector. A 28V lipo was wired directly into a regulated 12V bus. That bus apparently was also connected to internal parts, and wasn’t protected against backflow (defence in depth failure). Magic smoke was lost.