3 ms·
Uh no, do not put 50,000 volts through 12 AWG wire.
by titzer 4y ago
Uh no, do not put 50,000 volts through 12 AWG wire.
- jefftk 4y agoWhat goes wrong?
- WJW 4y agoMost store-bought wires won't have sufficient covering to prevent arcing, so you might get a short circuit somewhere. If you insulate the wires sufficiently however, any wire will take almost any voltage. It's the current you should worry about, as other commenters have already mentioned.
- cesaref 4y agoAs has been stated, voltage isn't a limitation, its the current that. Go and look at the HT wiring used in a cathode ray tube display, and you'll see it's a lot less that 12 AWG, and happily carries 10-20kV.
- the_third_wave 4y agoWhen I went to high school the teacher told about a science fair where someone had put a sign next to his project reading: WARNING 2 million Ohms (or something like that, I don't remember the actual number of Ohms for this specific project) A remarkable number of people kept their distance from this obviously dangerous experiment. The chemistry-equivalent of this joke is to warn everyone around you of the presence of dangerous di-Hydrogen Oxide which kills hundreds of thousands of people every year.
- rascul 4y ago> The chemistry-equivalent of this joke is to warn everyone around you of the presence of dangerous di-Hydrogen Oxide which kills hundreds of thousands of people every year. https://dhmo.org/facts.html https://dhmo.org/facts.html
- comboy 4y agoIn their defense, maybe those people didn't know if it's a project by a very clever student or by the one who mixes up units ;)
- elliottkember 4y ago2 million ohms? Not bad, not terrible. Vasily, get the good Ohmmeter from the safe.
- quickthrowman 4y agoWhy not? You obviously wouldn’t do it to a THHN conductor that is rated for 600v, but there are certainly #12 AWG conductors rated for higher voltages. They have a whole lot more insulation/layers than a regular 600v rated conductor, see: https://www.powerandcables.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Figure-2.jpg https://www.powerandcables.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Fi... High voltage utility distribution lines aren’t insulated by anything other than porcelain bushings and air.
- gooseyman 4y agoCame here to say this. Romex/THHN might be a bad idea, but that's because they weren't insulated for this purpose. 12 AWG would work.
- josephcsible 4y agoThe term "12 AWG" only specifies conductor thickness. Voltage is limited by insulation and current is limited by conductor thickness. Assuming sufficient insulation, it's safe to run arbitrarily high voltages through any conductor, since it doesn't even "see" the voltage.