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Charger Heat Issue

C

ccashman92

macrumors regular
Original poster
My 2010 MacBook Pro charger is running ad-normally hot. I can't touch the connector without it burning me. It is insanely hot. I'm surprised it isn't smoking. I have to fiddle with it to make it charge but it picks it up as connected even if it isn't charging.

Is there something wrong? Or have I not noticed this before?
 
if the connector is hot, its short-circuiting, at least I can't see any other logical explanation.
 
Being an ex-electrical engineer, it's not a Short.

Heat is created when current flows through a resistor. Your problem is the charging current is going through a connection that isn't very good. That means the metal-to-metal contacts of the connector are not mated properly.

Could be the contact point of the connector are only mating on a very tiny spot, or there may be something on the contacts, like carbon (a resistor) that is generating the heat as the charging current flows through it.

If it was a short, the battery would not charge and the power brick would be very hot ,or burned up as to much current tried to to go through very small transformer wires.

Recheck the contact points on the connector.
 
Terry Norton said:
Recheck the contact points on the connector.
Click to expand...

Since the connector is magnetic, there are often posts here about little metallic crap getting sucked into the little milled out part where the pins sit. You may have to clean such things out (you should unplug it first).
mulo said:
if the connector is hot, its short-circuiting, at least I can't see any other logical explanation.
Click to expand...

More likely you don't actually know what's going on and posted the first electricity-related buzzwords you could think of.
 
miles01110 said:
Since the connector is magnetic, there are often posts here about little metallic crap getting sucked into the little milled out part where the pins sit. You may have to clean such things out (you should unplug it first).


More likely you don't actually know what's going on and posted the first electricity-related buzzwords you could think of.
Click to expand...

So, Q-tip? Or whats the best solution to cleaning it out?
 
Probably tweezers if there's debris stuck to the magnet or a pin; otherwise the best thing would probably be a lint-free cloth so you don't get any stray fibers stuck in there as well.
 
miles01110 said:
Probably tweezers if there's debris stuck to the magnet or a pin; otherwise the best thing would probably be a lint-free cloth so you don't get any stray fibers stuck in there as well.
Click to expand...

Nothing I can see and its still happening.
 
Just throwing it out there, but the locations of maximum heat generation are where the resistance is highest. But the TOTAL AMOUNT of heat generated is greatest when the total resistance is low, which means lots of current.

So a large amount of heat will be generated in a circuit which has low resistance, and will be focussed at the point in the circuit of highest resistance.

The power brick should have quite low resistance (to increase efficiency), and the insides of the computer should have a high resistance, limiting the amount of current.



Does the power cord still charge your computer as quickly as it should?

I would say it's either a chip of metal in the connector, or a damaged cord. Either one could be causing a partial short, causing the current flow to be greatly increased (hence much more heat) or an increase in resistance, causing the heat generation to be focussed at the connector.

I expect finding out what's wrong would require a multimeter.

But the end result is simple. Get it replaced.
 
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