Hook Up Wire for Airbrake

[Webby]

Hi Guys, I'm new to this excellent forum.

I'm waiting to receive components in the post from Mouser for an Airbrake build but I need some help regarding what gauge/type of hook up wire to use on this build. I'm from the U.K. so I'm a little unfamiliar with what A.W.G. means, is it American Wire Gauge?

Anyway! I'm presuming that I need to go for PTFE insulated, high temp wire but how thick should the wire be?

Can one of you guys tell me the correct gauge to use in fractions of an inch, rather than gauges?!

Maybe somebody could give me a conversion chart expressing gauges in fractions of an inch?

Your Help would be sorely appreciated!

[paulster]

AWG is indeed American Wire Gauge.

If you're planning to source the cable at home then you'll probably want an AWG to mm2 conversion, which is how you'll generally find cable specified in the UK:

http://www.palonn.com/sommer_cable/awg_mm.htm

If you're going to use stranded cable then 16/0.2 (0.5mm2) will be ideal. 24/0.2 (0.75mm2) is better rated for current but is going to be awkward to work with in the selector switch, so 16/0.2 would probably be more practical and you're going to be using very short runs anyway with a duty cycle on the current.

[Webby]

Thanks!

So the way I see it 16/0.2 (0.5mm2) is around 20 AWG?

[paulster]

Exactly.

To get very technical, 16/0.2 means 16 strands of 0.2mm diameter wire, so each strand is 0.03mm2 cross-sectional area and 16 of these total up to 0.5mm2.

mm2 cable designations are a whole lot easier for me to get my head round than AWG. Then again so are millimetres and metric bolt sizes!

[Webby]

Thanks Paulster.

[MasterDisaster]

I have set up an Excel calculator so feel free to use.

Mike Lind

[Webby]

Thanks Everyone!