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).]
