On Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:18:22 -0500, E Z Peaces
wrote:

Tony wrote:
Bob Villa wrote:


And you could tin the ends of stranded for termination.

By doing so you take away flexibility of the stranded wire so right at
your connection it is more likely to fail. As much as I hate crimped on
wire connectors and always believed soldered was better than connectors,
where there is a lot of vibration they do last much longer than soldered
on wires. Can someone check with NASA?

Suppose I wanted to replace an 18-gage lamp cord. If it had 19 strands
of 30-gage, like much automotive wire, it would probably screw down to
the socket pretty well. But 18-gage lamp cord may have 41 strands of
34-gage. Twelve-gage zip cord could be worse; it might have 65 strands.

It can be hard to get wire with a lot of strands to stay under a screw.
What would be wrong with tinning? Within the lamp, strain and
vibration shouldn't be problems.

If instead of a screw terminal, I wanted to use a wire nut on zip cord
with a lot of strands, I might try tinning if I had trouble. I wonder
if that would violate the NEC. (Some wire nuts will screw down far
enough to clamp the insulated part of a cord.)


Just "hard twist" the wire and you are usually OK. IF you solder the
end, make sure there is a strain relief close to the connection to
prevent flexing of the wire near the soldered end.