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When attaching a red and black pair of Powerpoles together, which way should I do it to ensure that it will plug into the most number of other people's gear?
When looking from the top of the connector (the side where the "tongue" is not visible) should the red one be on the left or the right when viewed from the front?
They say a picture is worth a thousand words:
Source: ARRL
If viewed from the "hood" side where the connector is flat, with the wires going down, and the mating side of the connector up, then the positive side is on the right.
Other amateur radio sources that corroborate this orientation:
Beware: this is a recommendation, not a standard. Hopefully within amateur radio people observe the ARRL recommendation, but Powerpole connectors are made of individual pieces which can be stacked in any orientation. If you do an image search you can find examples where people have assembled them the other way. There's significant potential for an expensive mistake here.
From http://rallynotes.com/2017/03/12v-anderson-powerpoles/:
This is a good image for orientation reference.
The mnemonic that I use is "red right tongue top". (It leaves out "when the connectors are pointed at you.") That is to say, when the tongues are up, then the red connector is on the right.
