Bob: Lee: Thank you.
At the local Home Depot and Lowe's here in Austin, you can buy the colored wire by the foot.
Bob Nelson
Like Bob mentioned, there is no differance in carrying capacity of stranded verses solid. The differance is in wiring to a device, also stranded wire costs more per foot. Another thing is you need to be careful when removing the insulation from the insulation ends of a stranded wire, as you may cut a strand or two of wire.
If you buy wire by the spool, usually 500 foot rolls, you can get differant colors, like; red, black, orange, blue, purple, white, yellow and green.
What I was told by a long time electrician when I was an apprentice; it is easier to run a heavier wire than what you need the first time, then to pull out the old wire and re-wire the circuit with heavier wire. The reasoning is that if you up-grade in amps with the circuit breaker or the transformer power available you won't have to buy all new wire.
Lee F.
Bob: Thanks for your advice AND the time you took to research an answer. You always come to my rescue. Appreciate it.
It's hard to say for sure without knowing how much current the lamps draw. I couldn't find any numbers in the owner's manual. But 20 AWG is good for 5 amperes, or 250 milliamperes per lamp, which is in the right ballpark. I would go with 16 AWG to double that to 500 milliamperes per lamp, for a good margin of safety.
For the track wiring, 14 AWG is good and perfectly safe for the 15-ampere ZW. But 12 AWG will slightly improve (reduce) any voltage drop, which might make you happier if your wiring runs are at all lengthy.
Remember that, as always, it doesn't matter electrically whether you use stranded or solid wire....;-)
Inspired by Timboy, we are, once again, considering another (Did I say another?) re-build project.
We hope to, once again, use the Highway Lights #12804 that we have on the present layout. There are around 20 or so. These lights have very thin wires. At the present time, they are strung in groups of five or six on, what I beleive to be, 20 gauge wires which, in turn, go to the barrier strips and then onto the accessories' transformer. At the same time, we would like to wire, in similar strips, to the ten or so buildings.
What gauge wire would you suggest, that we should consider for the host wire?
Also, would you suggest 12 or 14 gauge for power to the track? (Traditional, Tubular, O27, ZW) New project, maybe new thinking)
As always, many thanks.
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