[AT] Wire size

[Larry D Goss]

FWIW, resistance varies according to the cross-sectional size of the wire 
and it makes more sense to write that size in square millimeters rather in 
square inches because of the numbers involved and because electricity is 
almost completely metric.  If you look at the website H.L pointed to, you'll 
see that the inch measurement for area isn't even listed.  There's a reason 
for that -- no one uses it.  Six square millimeters is between 9 and 10 
gauge wire.  For the distances involved between cylinders of the engine, 
either size would probably work because it's going to be nearly a dead short 
anyway -- something on the order of 0.0003 ohms.  I'm assuming the length of 
each piece is going to be around 1/6 of a meter -- a little more than 6 
inches.  I doubt that there is a fuse in the glow plug circuit.  Since any 
fuse would have a tendency to glow anyway, often an extra glow plug is 
installed in the instrument panel for that purpose.  And, don't confuse 7 
millimeter DIAMETER insulation on spark plug wires as being anything close 
to what's needed for this application.

This thread reminds me that we had lots of #9 wire around the farm all the 
time when I was a kid.  Dad brought home a couple hundred feet of it from 
the salvage yard at GE in the mid-thirties.  We used it for everything.  It 
was just the right size for making a chicken wire for catching a chicken for 
Sunday dinner.  About 60 or 70 feet of it got strung up between some trees 
as a permanent clothes line.  My mother would wash it off every Monday 
morning so the clothes wouldn't get stained from either the copper or the 
bird droppings.  That wire developed a beautiful brown patina on it from her 
constant attention to making sure it was clean.

Larry

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Mullrbob at wmconnect.com>
To: <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2006 6:27 PM
Subject: Re: [AT] Wire size


> See what size fuse is in the circuit and go from that. # 14 AWG is good 
> for
> 15 amps, # 12 AWG is good for 20 Amps and # 10 AWG is good for 30 amps. 
> Surely
> they don't name their fuses in MM!
>
> Thanks,
> Robert Mull
> Woodstock, Georgia
>
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