Partimewages
Solar Addict
You're a better man than me. I stopped attic work 10 years ago!
In the old part of Santa Fe nm Ive seen this with porcelain insulators screwed to vigas (round log roof beams) with braided cloth covered wire. This was done when electricity finally got here in the early 1900s. Wires went down to a fist sized rotary switch for the ONE light that was in the house. Crazy but cool.Oh, im in an attic right now working on the hvac in a pre 1920 house, and this stuff is all over the place..
Wasnt it only used because WW2 needed all the copper and drove copper prices sky high?in the era when it was popular.
It was after WW2, in the 60's and 70's.Wasnt it only used because WW2 needed all the copper and drove copper prices sky high?
As I once said in one of my videos, "Some people buy $8 coffee's and some buy copper".
Entrance cable, I might use aluminum. Anything else is copper. Even the plumbing in my house and shop are copper. The airlines in my shop are 1 inch copper.
This is the shop heating system, more copper. I love copper.
View attachment 210460
There is some aircraft wire that is silver plated aluminum. I assume that it is used because the Al portion is light and the frequency is often 400 hz, so the silver might be doing most of the load carrying. No personal experience with it.
Put it together myself. Had to replace the boiler a year ago on New Years weekend. Of course everything was backwards for hookups.Nice setup
I've been on many jobs to replace an aluminum tube and fin evaporator with a copper tube and fin.Copper is great for boilers and plumbing.
But is sure is expensive to repair.
I have been on SOOOO many boiler jobs where the copper is eaten with holes throughout.
And copper coils in hvac was ok in the beginning when thick tubing was used, but when epa started requiring efficient standards, coils were just too thin, and they all failed.
Aluminum lasts. It is superior to copper in wet environments. It has points of failure, but better than copper when done right.
You are incorrect. Go check your Machinery's Handbook.It just has to have more surface area to be as efficient with heat transfer.
Toyota's been putting 100% Aluminum micro channel evaps and condensers in their cars for about 20 years now. They stick those things in the front of the car and let 'em collect dirt, rain, bugs, gravel at 70mph for 10 years and they still work. Not sure why they can't catch on in stationary applications.Every mini split I've installed has copper tube and fin. Every heavy duty application that requires longevity has copper tube and fin. Long term aluminum tube and fin evaporators fail. Copper tube and fin can be missing half the aluminum fins, yet it still has good heat transfer. Same goes for condensers.
The only reason one sees aluminum condensers is due to parallel flow in order to cut weight/size and try to gain efficiency with small passages in each tube. This increases the surface contact area of the tube. Parallel flow has it's problems, but is cheap to manufacture. The small passages plug over time leading to decreased heat transfer as refrigerant is not flowing thru the passages.
That is a parallel flow condenser. It is used in automotive applications because it is cheap to manufacture and can have a higher heat exchange in a smaller package due to the micro passages.Toyota's been putting 100% Aluminum micro channel evaps and condensers in their cars for about 20 years now. They stick those things in the front of the car and let 'em collect dirt, rain, bugs, gravel at 70mph for 10 years and they still work. Not sure why they can't catch on in stationary applications.
Looking over this thread trying to justify going with CCA but no, simply due to resistance.Aluminum lasts. It is superior to copper in wet environments. It has points of failure, but better than copper when done right.
Respectfully nobody here is recommending to pretend Aluminum wire that's copper clad is the same as copper so a bit of a strawman there.Copper and aluminum have different properties and respond differently to how they carry electrical loads. It is just unsafe to clad aluminum with copper pretending you have a solid copper conductor and than use that as a basis for rating it.
But it's fine to just talk about "voltage drop" since its intrinsically connected to the loss in power. It's just another variable describing the same symptom and the answer when going Aluminum is simply 1 size bigger then none of this power loss happens.Voltage Drop: V= IR
Power Lost: P = I^2 R = V^2/R
I care about power (W) lost in my PV cables as a function of current (I), more than I do voltage drop.
If my panels are generating 1920W, but I’m losing 100W in the run, that is signifcant.
Losing 10W, who cares?
But you won't be as long as you calculated correctly and got the bigger Alu wire...Hi what do you mean by don't do that? Why not? Didn't worry about voltage drop?
It's not the reason I need thicker cable though. Strictly amps. I never cared about 3% drop.
This is a 1st world mentality, which I realize many commenting in the thread are North American or in Europe but for those of us in developing countries the price difference absolutely is more than a "ho hum" deal. In addition, it's pretty common to buy copper wire here and told it's 99.9% pure etc. only to find out you got shafted and now have some mystery metal in your house. At lease with the aluminum stuff there is less reason to cheat / lie and the savings are *SUBSTANTIAL*Great thread title!
Aluminum doesn't seem worth the extra trouble for a small cost savinga, at least for somebody not in the trade. I'm sure I can be done correctly, but for me saving money on wire is not worth the tradeoff of worrying.
I'd love to see 104 year old copperOh, im in an attic right now working on the hvac in a pre 1920 house, and this stuff is all over the place... id love to see how aluminum wiri g looks in a hundred years...
Silver is for kings,Copper is for kings, aluminum is for the peasants.
Anyone look at copper futures lately? It seems there might be a little squeeze taking place on the Comex.
Another European here. My YAKY and YAKXS wiring would like a word...From a European perspective: what's aluminium wire?
On a serious note, it's used on power distribution, but I've never seen any aluminium wire used in residential in any of the EU countries I've been/lived in.
I see you speak for the group. However my comment was not a strawman because it was to the point you made later in your post about buying supposedly copper wire (rated as such) only to find it was CCA.Respectfully nobody here is recommending to pretend Aluminum wire that's copper clad is the same as copper so a bit of a strawman there.
....
I'd love to see 104 year old copper
Silver is for kings,
copper is for peasants
And those that do not know any better.Aluminum is for other peasants
Was it in a vacuum ovenI've seen wiring that old. looks fine and intact.
Were the alloys so much worse? Or are these outlets and switches corroding aluminium wiring because of brass/copper being in contact with it? If the former I'm very interested what is it that makes today's aluminium better. Better purity? I always thought aluminium in the wires is as pure as possible (as opposed to alloys containing magnesium, silicone and copper found elsewhere).Aluminum is for loads ove 30A, that is provisioned for increased size wiring, NEVER directly connected to major appliances, always routed between breakers and disconnects.
I have never seen aluminum directly connected to appliances.
Outlets and luminary fixtures need copper clad aluminum or pure copper.
All the "aluminum wiring fires" were from outlets and light switches that got loose connections from loads.
I cringe when i come up on houses from the 70s with aluminum wiring to the outlets and switches.
Costs a bundle to remove all fixtures and install the purple splicers.
Less than a burned down house for sure though.
The worst is when the house has a zinsco main panel, run to a federal pacific subpanel, with all aluminum wiring.
Here, we use aluminium a lot (outside buildings, very heavy gauge wiring) and every electric supply store has special crimp things and even screw blocks one can use to safely connect aluminium and copper wiring.