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Hi everyone, I just bought a second hand window A/C unit. (Bad move, I know…) Its working well, but the plug is getting very hot. When I take it out of the socket, the prongs are hot enough to burn me. The strange thing is that the wire itself doesn’t feel hot, only the plug. When I used an extension cord the whole extension cord heated up. I tried 2 different sockets on 2 different circuits and got the same results. The A/C is 12 amp, on a 16 amp breaker. Anyone have an idea what the problem could be, and can it be fixed? Thanks very much!

@spare do not use an extension cord is number 1. Number 2 is that your breaker at 16amps is underrated since you most likely have other things on that particular branch of your circuit. Number 3 would be to clean the AC properly since a dirty AC will attempt to continuously run to keep up with the workload. Since we do not know what AC unit you have, it is difficult to figure out the BTU of the unit compared to your room size. If your AC output is to small for the area you are trying to cool down, your AC will try to cool it down but wont keep up with it. This can cause the compressor to run all the time and it will draw maximum amperage. There is nothing touching the plug and it is not the plug that is at fault here.

Your unit is drawing too much power for one of the components which is touching the plug. That’s why it is too hot. The fact that the wire doesn’t get hot but the plug does tells me that the plug itself may be defective. Or maybe the outlet is defective, or under-rated for the amount of power being drawn. The extension cord is not adequate for the amount of current being drawn; that’s why the extension cord is getting hot. Whatever you do, make sure that you have the correct size breaker for the electrical circuit. This should prevent an electrical fire from starting. In these cases, I ALWAYS get a professional electrician involved. You need to make sure that EVERYTHING involved here is up to the task and not defective: wiring, outlet, plug, a/c unit, circuit breaker, etc etc. The last thing you want is some defective component starting an electrical fire.

I have the same problem.. the electric plug in my air conditioning (AC ) feels extremely HOT..…I found it some what helpful if you consider the following :

  1. the reason the plug gets hotter than the outlet cause of the Guage of the copper wire in the plug is thinner than the one in the outlet…
  2. the connection contact in them is weak, thus it creates heat.3) operate the AC on “LOW”…4) GOOD LUCK. …

Extension cord overloads are among the most frequent causes of overheating. When you plug in electronics that draw more electricity than the cord is rated for, this happens. It’s also a good idea to calculate the total loads of the items you wish to connect to your extension cord and see if it can handle them. In this case, the formula Ampere=Watts/volt may be useful for determining the load of each electronic device. Then, you can add all amperes up and compare the total to the extension cord’s rating.