SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Electrical shock / short

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20180604-39BF9-2147387562. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: Porter Cable 7518 (Porter Cable 7518 3 1/2 HP Router (Previously Recalled) for heavy duty applications). Incident: I use this heavy-duty router in my shop. It is not used frequently, but is required for special radii in wood projects and plastic projects. It is used in an aluminum router table, the router is also aluminum cast. Last week when inspecting the router and planning to put a shorter cord set on it, I found degraded power wires with cracking wire jackets. These were found on both the ground and power wires from the plug all the way to the internal switch block. The wire jackets were falling off which meant that any slight contact would have created a serious short on the machine and since it is not a grounded machine by design, it could have been a very serious issue. The router is kept inside in a cabinet, never subjected to the outside or misuse. It still looks brand new, but may have been purchased approximately ten years ago by myself. Porter Cable contacted me to take it to a repair facility if it is still under warranty. This is not acceptable and it should have been replaced and shipped back to the manufacturer for inspection. Note that PC has also sent me a new insulated handle a few years ago to handle any potential shocks as a result of short circuit - again, I'm just curious if this was related.