Anderson SB175 or 100% compatible

Living in the north of the northern Highland comes with its own kind of specific “challenges” (as one would euphemistally phrase in today’s project world).

One of it would be that most delivery is only to “Mainland UK” which is sort of extends only to south of Inverness (which is only somehow understandable when one looks far back at the “Caledonian orogeny“). Anyway.

But even worse: Along with that delivery restriction comes the fact that there are also only very little shops with proper (or professional) selection of material up here. And this is also quite logical in itself. What could be sold in a shop, if nothing can be delivered to it?

This seems to have led to a “What we don’t have, you don’t need” attitude (no offence) and a supply:demand ratio that equates to higher sales prices.

So why am I writing this? I was looking for high current DC connectors for the battery systems I am making, I was looking to buy the Anderson Power Product SB 175 Connector. But the trusted (or only) electrician shop up here (CEF, a nationwide chain of 390 shops across UK) does not stock them, so I would have to resort to Mouser Electronics or Digi-Key Electronics for online ordering. There prices are about the same around 20 GBP per connector, which is not spent easily and about twice as much as other resellers or distributors charge (according to the Anderson web site).

In Switzerland I saw Distrelec selling compatible connectors under its house brand “RND Connect” for a converted price of 15 GBP (depending on the current exchange rate). This is not much of a saving taking into consideration that these are only rated for 175A instead of 280A.

And then there are numerous sellers on Aliexpress where we do not know beforehand what we actually get – but at a much lower price point.

So I went shopping to see the quality of the different manufacturers. My criteria for ordering were availability, low shipping cost and good reviews.

I also ordered a shop with pre-manufactured cables and one with handles (where the price difference is even bigger).

I post an update when the items arrived and I had time to test them. So then we will see if these connectors can compete and are really compatible.