Aluminum building wiring

1970 East Berlin: workers in VEB Kabelwerk Oberspree producing aluminum wires with a SKET-built machine

Aluminum building wiring is a type of electrical wiring for residential construction or houses that uses aluminum electrical conductors. Aluminum provides a better conductivity-to-weight ratio than copper, and therefore is also used for wiring power grids, including overhead power transmission lines and local power distribution lines, as well as for power wiring of some airplanes.[1][2] Utility companies have used aluminum wire for electrical transmission in power grids since around the late 1800s to the early 1900s. It has cost and weight advantages over copper wires. Aluminum in power transmission and distribution applications is still the preferred wire material today.[3]

In North American residential construction, aluminum wire was used for wiring entire houses for a short time from the 1960s to the mid-1970s during a period of high copper prices. Electrical devices (outlets, switches, lighting, fans, etc.) at the time were not designed with the particular properties of the aluminum wire being used in mind, and there were some issues related to the properties of the wire itself, making the installations with aluminum wire much more susceptible to problems. Revised manufacturing standards for both the wire and the devices were developed to reduce the problems. Existing homes with this older aluminum wiring used in branch circuits present a potential fire hazard.

In communist former East Germany (GDR, 1945-1990), aluminum or Copper-clad aluminium wire (″AlCu-Kabel″) had to be used for wiring as copper was expensive to import.[4] While all devices were designed for aluminum during that era, this ended with unification in 1990 when standard Western European equipment became available and the national public owned enterprises (Volkseigener Betrieb) went out of business.

  1. ^ Telecommunications and networks, Khateeb M. Hussain, Donna Hussain
  2. ^ Aircraft Wire. mechanicsupport.com
  3. ^ "Anaheim Aluminum Wiring Facts and Fallacies". Accurateelectricalservices.com. 2011-02-04. Archived from the original on 2013-12-07. Retrieved 2012-03-07. Electricity is transmitted from the utility generating stations to individual meters using almost exclusively aluminum wiring. In the U.S., utilities have used aluminum wire for over 100 years.
  4. ^ "Aluminium Verkabelung - die typische DDR Verkabelung".