Thermocouple
wires, RTD, Intrumentation Cable, Heating Cable, High temperature Appliance cable. A
wire is a single, usually cylindrical, elongated strand of drawn metal. Wires
are used to bear mechanical loads and to carry electricity and telecommunications
signals. Standard sizes are determined by various wire gauges. The term wire is
also used more loosely to refer to a bundle of such strands, as in 'multistranded
wire', which is more correctly termed a cable.
Wire
has many uses. It forms the raw material of many important manufacturers, such
as the wire-net industry, wire-cloth making and wire-rope spinning, in which it
occupies a place analogous to a textile fibre. Wire-cloth of all degrees of strength
and fineness of mesh is used for sifting and screening machinery, for draining
paper pulp, for window screens, and for many other purposes. Vast quantities of
aluminium, copper, nickel and steel wire are employed for telephone and data wires
and cables, and as conductors in electric power transmission, and heating. It
is in no less demand for fencing, and much is consumed in the construction of
suspension bridges, and cages, etc. In the manufacture of stringed musical instruments
and scientific instruments wire is again largely used. Among its other sources
of consumption it is sufficient to mention pin and hair-pin making, the needle
and fish-hook industries, nail, peg and rivet making, and carding machinery; indeed
there are few industries into which it does not enter. Not
all metals and metallic alloys possess the physical properties necessary to make
useful wire. The metals must in the first place be ductile and strong in tension,
the quality on which the utility of wire principally depends. The metals suitable
for wire, possessing almost equal ductility, are platinum, silver, iron, copper,
aluminium and gold; and it is only from these and certain of their alloys with
other metals, principally brass and bronze, that wire is prepared. By careful
treatment extremely thin wire can be produced. Special purpose wire is however
made from other metals (e.g. tungsten wire for light bulb and vacuum tube filaments,
because of its high melting temperature). | |