Protecting Your IP Protection Rating

Recently my friend decided she was going to sell some items she doesn’t need anymore. One of these items was a custom-tailored dress she’d had made for a special occasion. It was a beautiful dress and very unique in the style. She used elements from different styles that fit her body type best and had them all tied into one. Because it’s a custom dress that had to be taken in a few times, she’s having a hard time deciding what size to advertise it as. I suggested she state what size she was when the dress was last worn.

There are often items that are hard to designate with a specific title. While it may have been created with a specific intention in mind, it doesn’t necessarily have the formal certifications. Take the Polycase HD plastic enclosure series. This series was designed with specific characteristics in mind. We wanted the enclosure to be able to meet the IP66 standards. This means that the enclosure protects from the ingress of water and dust, shielding the electronics housed inside.

A little known fact about the IP ratings is that machining the enclosures can affect this rating. While it makes sense that the whole premise behind IP66 is that water is prevented from getting inside the electronics, and machining a hole could potentially allow water in through the new opening, there are ways to circumvent (I know, but how often do you get to use that word in real life?) any damage to the rating. The reason we could not certify these enclosures for the IP rating is because we know you will need the machining to accommodate your connectors and cables, and at that point the rating is no longer valid.

Polycase sells cable glands. These little gadgets slide into the machined hole and act as a seal around your wires and cables. See how here. This is just one method of protecting the IP rating once the enclosures are machined.

Want to explore more ways to protect your IP and NEMA ratings? Any suggestions for other tricks we can throw out?