What is guage?

[electrolove]

I'm trying to translate guage to Swedish. I have seen lots of guage talk on this forum when it comes to cables. For example: 12 guage stranded wire. Can someone please explain what that means so I know what to look for here in Sweden?

[Anonymous]

its just a system for defining the *diameter* of a wire, or the bore of a shotgun, etc

its nothing more than a geometrical progression ..... it also used to describe the thickness of steel stock, etc

here's a quickie conversion for wire into mm ...

http://www.mogami.com/e/cad/wire-gauge.html

[cacole]

Wire gauge denotes the diameter of the wire if it is a single strand, or the combined diameter for stranded wire.

Using your example of 12 Gauge, that means the wire has a bare diameter (with the insulation stripped off) of .0808 inches, or 6530 circular mils. This is the size in AWG (American Wire Gauge) measurement.

You should be able to find a chart somewhere on the Internet, perhaps through a Google search, of wire gauges in metric terms instead of the U.S. feet and inches.

By typing the phrase "Wire Gauge" into Google, I found all manner of charts and conversions available from around the world.

[electrolove]

If I translate conductor size 18 AWG it will give me a diameter of 1.024 mm. Can someone confirm this?

This seems to be the bare wire with the insulation removed.

What is solid and stranded?

[Anonymous]

solid wire ..... a single strand of copper, aluminum, etc, within the insulation, that carries the current

stranded wire ...... many strands of wire, that add up to the gauge/diameter (approximately), within the insulation, that carries the current

[electrolove]

Just found a nice conversion table on the net. Makes things a little easier for me.

[electrolove]

yardgoat46:

So this is a stranded wire?



And this is a solid wire?

[cacole]

Yes, your top photo is stranded wire, and the bottom photo is two solid conductors.

It's really difficult to make out the top photo, but it appears to have two separate stranded conductors surrounded by a stranded wire shield, or is this just an optical illusion because of the camera angle.

[TomDiehl]

"Guage" is the common misspelling of "gauge." If you're trying to translate it, you may be having problems because of the missspelling.

[rexhea]

Electro.
Contact your local electrical supplier and ask them the conversion for USA wire to the standard that Sweden uses. Tell them you want the equivalent size wire to the American Wire Gauge (AWG) size 12. There are many electrical wire standards around the world (many based on cross-sectional area) and I am not sure which Sweden uses.

[BR60103]

I trust you noticed that the gauge number increases as the wire size decreases.
There are wires bigger than gauge 0; I think that streetcar lines used something like 0000.

[Anonymous]

So, Electrolove ....

Concerning that table that you posted ..... that is how you ask for wire in Europe? You might ask for "2.0 mm2" wire if you are doing work inside your house? Or, what terminalogy would you use when you ask for a specific size wire? Or will translation mess everything up here.

And, you mention your "crappy English." I read your posts, and I think you may speak better Engli***han I do! Lol. Certainly better than alot of people I know here in the US.

And, is it true that all the girls in Sweden have blonde hair and blue eyes, and so beautiful? And they just spend their days skiing in tight ski sweaters, and the evenings inside the ski lodge in a hot tub in a bikini? And they talk with that accent that drives me nuts? Please, tell me that it is all really true.

Jim

[electrolove]

yardgoat46:

Hahahahahah...

The grass is always greener on the other side, so I don't think Swedish girls are so special. But sometimes they can really [censored]

When it comes to wire it seems that here in Sweden they use mm (diameter).

[Anonymous]

And Yardgoat, whose wife is pregnent? Looking to sleep in the train room forever? Keep it up and the lawyer will insist that your wife get all the trains and the internet connection!

[Anonymous]

Those dang divorce lawyers will have to pry my HO engines from my cold, dead hands!

I think my wife gets a kick out of this little mental defect I have concerning trains and railroading. Although, I'm not really sure if she is laughing with me, or at me.

My wife knows that when I met her ..... I changed from loving petit, blonde girls ..... to loving taller, Italian looking girls like her.

Once in a while my eyes wonder, but she is quick to give me a slap in the back of the head, and I snap out of it.

Jim

[Jetrock]

"Gauge" can mean any number of things:

* The diameter of wire

* The distance between rails on a railroad

* A meter for measuring something (like an air gauge)

But yeah, there is no "guage" except for lmisspellings and typos...

[electrolove]

It seems that they describe cables in Sweden by area (mm2). Can someone please confirm the following numbers?

AWG 18 = 0.8 mm2
AWG 12 = 3.3 mm2

I just looked at elfa.se, that is Swedens biggest store when it comes to cables and things like that. But it seems inpossible to know what to use. It's just too many cables to choose from. Is the quality important? What makes a good cable good? I think I will move to the US soon, hehe...

[Jetrock]

Those conversion measurements seem about right.

One point of nomenclature: typically things that thin are called "wires" rather than cables--"cable" generally refers to very heavy, thick wires, whereas when one refers to the things in an electronic device, the term "wires" is used.