3 ms·

Hasn't anyone tried using silver wires?

• tzs 2y ago
  Silver wire is used for some things, but it is a lot more expensive than copper which rules it out for most applications. Here is a table of the conductivity (in units of 10^7 S/m), the density, and the cost of copper (Cu), aluminum (Al), silver (Ag), and gold (Au). Cu Al Ag Au Conductivity 5.96 3.5 6.3 4.1 g/cm^3 8.96 2.6 10.5 19.3 $/kg 9.03 1.2 1030 92100 If we had a copper wire with a specified capacity in amps, here is what aluminum, silver, and gold wires of the same length and capacity would weigh and cost as a percentage of the weight and cost of the copper wire, and what their diameter would be as a percentage of the diameter of the copper wire. Weight Cost Diameter Al 49 7 139 Ag 110 12646 97 Au 310 3190000 121
  • mrlonglong 2y ago
    Suppose Ag was as cheap as, or even cheaper than Al, would it be more useful?
    • haneefmubarak 2y ago
      Sure, we could alloy and/or plate it. You have a source on Ag cheaper than Al you'd like to disclose to the class?
      • mrlonglong 2y ago
        Silver and gold could be a lot more useful to society if they weren't so expensive. Plenty of asteroids out there to mine.