Another molex connector question

demogo

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Just curious about something... I've read that molex male connectors typically have sockets and the molex female connectors typically have pins, at least when dealing with power connectors.

I'd read somewhere else that this is typically the case.

Now I'm reading Bob's pages here: www.homearcade.org/bbbb/plus.html

where he describes how he rigs up his jamma plus control harnesses and noticed that he mentions molex plugs with pins and molex receptacles with sockets.

Isn't this the opposite of how most connectors are put together (see power example above)? I guess in this case it doesn't really matter because it's all custom connectors anyway and you'd never typically be doing this with other parts?

Thoughts?
 
Like I mentioned in your other post about something similar, I have a bunch of cut-out molex connector that I keep in case I need to adapt a connector. A lot of times I'll find the right male or female molex, and then find out that both have female or male pins, and that I have to get my Molex pin remover and pop one side out and add the opposite pins to the wires so I can connect it up.

Perhaps they made it a standard for NOW, but it seems lots of games from back in the day did it however they wanted...
 
Perhaps they made it a standard for NOW, but it seems lots of operators from back in the day did it however they wanted...

Fixed.

The standard was and is the male plug has sockets and is the side carrying any live voltages. The female side has pins and is the passive side.

Male side
03-09-1094.gif


Female side
03-09-2092.gif


The idea being to protect the live voltages by isolating them in the individual wells of the male side. If the live voltages were on the female side any stray piece of metal could get in and short across the pins with very exciting results.

ken

PS: Images stolen from GPE.
 
I normally see mismatches in ones like these:

42179_3C_rec_thumb.jpg


42179_3C_plug_thumb.jpg


Sometimes the male will have female pins, and sometimes it will have male pins....





Images stolen from Molex...
 
That's crazy. Sounds like there's lots of gender confusion out there.

So bottom line -- there is a standard that isn't followed all that well.

I can see the logic behind Ken's reasoning and I'll do it that way, rather than the way that Bob did it.
 
That's crazy. Sounds like there's lots of gender confusion out there.

So bottom line -- there is a standard that isn't followed all that well.

I can see the logic behind Ken's reasoning and I'll do it that way, rather than the way that Bob did it.

On the type of connectors that Ken linked in, it doesn't make sense to put the sockets in the female end, because they're wider and you don't want any shorting between pins.

On the connectors I linked, it doesn't really matter other than having them all the same way makes it easier to swap others in and out...
 
On the type of connectors that Ken linked in, it doesn't make sense to put the sockets in the female end, because they're wider and you don't want any shorting between pins.

On the connectors I linked, it doesn't really matter other than having them all the same way makes it easier to swap others in and out...


Going by the drawings of both Molex and Tyco/AMP, Ken's description applies to both.
 
Going by the drawings of both Molex and Tyco/AMP, Ken's description applies to both.

I know, but when I'm having to adapt a monitor connector for a cab because the monitor I put in it doesn't match the connector in the cab, I always pull the males pins and change the connector because they're easier to get out, irregardless as which gender molex they are in...
 
The gender doesn't bother me as much as someone who runs three wires (hot, neutral and ground) up to the connector and only two on the other side (hot, neutral) and then runs a jumper wire all the way back to the power block for a ground ??!?? :confused:


ken
 
I know, but when I'm having to adapt a monitor connector for a cab because the monitor I put in it doesn't match the connector in the cab, I always pull the males pins and change the connector because they're easier to get out, irregardless as which gender molex they are in...

Right on

The gender doesn't bother me as much as someone who runs three wires (hot, neutral and ground) up to the connector and only two on the other side (hot, neutral) and then runs a jumper wire all the way back to the power block for a ground ??!?? :confused:


ken

Makes no sense to me, and I see it a lot.
 
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