Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by cf141q5325 1037 days ago
>We frequently use aluminum wires with a higher thickness to make up for the lower conductivity as compared to copper.

Aluminum wires even made it into residential housing when copper was expensive/rare. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminum_building_wiring

1 comments

Can confirm, my parents had an aluminium telephone line in the UK until it failed and had to be replaced. Moot point as it's replaced with a fibre optic cable now though.
The problem is with their usage as mains power. I think they are considered a fire hazard in older German homes.
Not surprising, any degradation in the connection leads to intermittent connection/high resistance fault = heat and poof, there it goes.