Older Table Lamp with Old Wire and Plug

A customer brought in this patient the other day and it was in need of obvious repair. The lamp cord was cracked and exposing the wire in the cord.

This lamp also had a really neat old plastic plug. It looks cool, but unfortunately it is not polarized and therefore it is not safe. The only lamp part we need to fix this lamp is a new lamp cord set. This includes the lamp cord with the plug molded onto the cord.

We start with unwiring the lamp socket. Metal lamp sockets like this one snap the socket shell into the socket cap. They are almost always marked with the work "press". To release the shell from the cap, apply pressure at this point and pry the shell away from the cap.

Now is a good time to inspect the socket insulator. The insulator on this lamp is well used and needs to be replaced.

The cord below the socket interior is cut and the socket interior is inspected for operation and burn. Pulling the chain on the interior sounds good and feels good. The inside is not burned, so we decide to reuse the interior.

The old cord is pulled from the lamp and the new cord is threaded through the lamp body. The new cord is a little thicker than the old cord so the hole on the lamp base needs to be reamed out a little. A rubber bushing is used in the hole to help insulate the wire against the lamp body.

The new lamp cord is pushed up through the lamp body. A UL knot is tied in the lamp cord and attached to the socket interior. The smooth cord connects to the hot terminal screw. This is normally the brass screw, but with an older socket interior, there might not be a brass and nickel screw. The positive terminal screw is the screw that connects to the center post in the interior.

The socket shell is replaced and snapped into the socket cap. The slack from the cord is pulled back through the lamp body.

A bulb is added and the lamp is tested.

Perfection! Total Cost < $5.00  Total Time < 20 minutes.