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Posted By: Trumpy Aluminium Cables - 11/30/02 04:30 AM
How much are Aluminium cables used in your
country?.
I had the task of connecting a 300mm2 3core+
Neutral with XLPE insulation, recently, at a Meat-works.
To say the least, it was a real job in itself, just to crimp the lugs onto the ends of the wires, these are filled with grease, to assist the crimp.
But, can anyone please tell me, if there is a manufactured form of acid or some other
chemical, that will remove the oxide layer
from the Al, before the crimp is made?, as
these wires are going to be carrying 400-600A, I would like to think that the oxide layer, has some resistance(electrically).
Any help on this, would be cool.
Posted By: pauluk Re: Aluminium Cables - 11/30/02 04:22 PM
I know AL is used in line work and some heavy industrial cabling, but that's a little out of my league, so I can't be more specific.

In normal residential work, aluminum never caught on as it did at one period in the States. Pre-metric cables were tinned copper rather than just bare copper, which sometimes leads people to believe that they have Al cables.
Posted By: CTwireman Re: Aluminium Cables - 11/30/02 06:04 PM
Trumpy, when terminating aluminum conductors in the US, the proper procedure is to first scour the freshly stripped conductor with a piece of sandcloth, then apply an anti-oxidant compound.

Aluminum is used still pretty common in residential settings, mostly for ervice entrance cable and the occasional feeder to a subpanel.

In commercial/industrial, it is used when the owners decide to "cheap out." Most of the projects I have seen or worked on have spec'd all copper for the entire job.

In utility work I believe aluminum is very common. (Correct me if I am wrong)
Posted By: David UK Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/01/02 12:42 AM
In the UK aluminium cables are not permitted below 16sq mm.
In my area only the PoCo use Al cables.
They installed a 100A 3 phase PME (MEN) service on a job of mine this week. The cable was 35mm Al 3 core concentric (neutral screened cable), the concentric screen is Cu.
Posted By: Trumpy Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/02/02 06:00 AM
Thanks for your replies, guys,
Aluminium is only used over here, where CU
becomes un-economical.
For Underground work, anything larger than
70-95mm2, will be laid in Al, as opposed to
Copper.
All of our Overhead Lines that carry more than 400V, are run in Aluminium, with a Steel
core, for mechanical strength.
CT-Wireman, what type of Anti-Oxidant is the
most used in the US?.
[Linked Image]
Posted By: CTwireman Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/02/02 04:14 PM
Trumpy, there are several different manufacturers that make it. Ideal Industries is one of the more popular brands. Here is the link for info on the product. Go to "Noalox".

http://www.idealindustries.com/wi/Accessories.nsf
Posted By: Trumpy Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/22/02 04:15 AM
Paul,
I was told by a migrant Electrician, from the UK, that Aluminium, was used for the internal wiring of houses, in the 60's, just like NM or TPS, except it had a stranded??,
aluminium core, that was larger than the Copper equivalent.
This was a real nuisance as far as terminating wires into a ceiling rose was concerned(as far as I was told), as I guess they were only 5A types, back then.
Could you or David please expand on this?.
[Linked Image]
Posted By: pauluk Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/22/02 12:33 PM
I've never heard of aluminum cables used in normal domestic branch circuit wiring here. As David mentioned, the IEE Regs. prohibit the use of smaller AL cables and have done so for a long time.

The metric-size cables introduced in 1970 are solid copper in all sizes up to 2.5 sq. mm.

Prior to that, we did use stranded cable much more often. The ring circuit was generally wired in a type known as 7/.029, for example (i.e. 7 strands, each .029" diameter). Although at first glance this wire might look like aluminum, it is in fact tinned copper strands.

Under this old system the only non-stranded cable in use was 1/.044, a very small size limited almost exclusively to domestic 5A lighting circuits. But even this was tinned copper, and therefore had a silver appearance.

You might like to look back at this thread.



[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 12-22-2002).]
Posted By: David UK Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/22/02 09:39 PM
Like I have said before, I have never seen Al conductors of small cross section in domestic wiring.
There used to be a reference to copper clad aluminium conductors in an older edition of the wiring regs.
I think they may have been used during a copper shortage in the early 70's.
I have seen a Cu clad Al conductor once only in my 20 years in the trade. It was used as a main earth bonding conductor to the water service in a house rewired around 1970, this cable was sized 10mm at a time when 6mm Cu would have been the norm.
Posted By: Texas_Ranger Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/23/02 12:00 PM
Some abandoned 1950ies wiring in our new bathroom was 1 mm2 PVC sheathed aluminum. (Single balck wires in plaster, we found it when taking down the tiles)
This was the only occasion I've ever seen aluminum wiring.
Posted By: sparky Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/24/02 01:50 AM
In the US there was a time when aluminum interior wiring was commonly installed, i want to say 30-40 years ago but i'm unsure.

It is frowned on now, and probably cost prohibitive to deal with should one wish to.
Posted By: lyledunn Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/24/02 06:29 PM
ACSR cables are pretty much the preserve of the power companies. They are used extensively on the overhead line network in Ireland. Primarily their main advantages are cost and weight even where they are required to be a larger csa than equivalent copper.
Trumpy, I am sure that you had no choice in the installation. Were it me, I would have paralleled two or more copper swa. Far easier to handle!
Posted By: nesparky Re: Aluminium Cables - 12/25/02 03:13 AM
As sparky said AWG size 14 12 and 10 were used in the late 60s and early 70s for all wiring in houses. I still get service calls on this junk. Most of the wire has been replaced by now The only place it it used now is for services and sometimes feeders in multi family buildings. The power companies use it a lot.
Almost every job I've bid in the past two years has specified all copper from the service in. [Linked Image]
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