Aluminum Body and Lightening
Aluminum wiring was band many years ago because it can cause house fires when arching. This is what happened when lightening hit an aluminum body Ford pickup. :E Clicky
Forum Discussion
Rover_Bill wrote:Just buy some stock in a copper mine to make such an inaccurate and obviously biased posting?
Aluminum wiring was band many years ago because it can cause house fires when arching. This is what happened when lightening hit an aluminum body Ford pickup. :E
Did you mean "bad" or "banned?"
If you meant "bad," there were some issues when it first started being used, because people were unfamiliar with it and used it incorrectly, mostly improper connections. Noting wrong with aluminum wire itself.
If you meant "banned," you're just plain old wrong. Aluminum wiring is listed in the NEC. What was banned was one particular aluminum wire alloy, called EC (aka 1350). It was replaced primarily with copper clad aluminum wire (CCA). It just needs to be used appropriately rated connectors/terminations. Even the cheapest outlets at Home Depot ($0.68) are rated for use with copper clad wire, and I doubt you can find any which aren't. There's also aluminum wire which isn't copper clad, made from a different alloy (AA-8000) than the EC which caused problems. The outlets compatible with that cost a bit more, like $2.
These days, whether to use copper or aluminum doesn't depend on safety, but material cost.
