Not really, it has to be insulated. Might do for some jobs though, does fuse wire flex (repeatedly) OK though ?
Good question.
I assume that's 7/0.2mm insulated wire - often referred to as 1 or 1.4A capacity. CPC do 10/0.1mm equipment wire which is 0.86mm diameter - but only in 100m to 500m lengths. (See this link for an example)
Picking up on that, I recall being asked to repair an iPod earpiece cable that a careless gardener had cut while pruning. That was very thin stranded/flexible wire. You may have what you need in the 'assorted cables' box.
Excellent idea.
Using the thinnes wire to hand, it's easy to put suitable loops in the wire to take up the bogie rotation. Maybe the wire will be more co-operative if you don't insult it.
It might need insulting to avoid upsetting an adjacent polarity ? You know how easy all the polarities are upset these days......Using the thinnest wire to hand, it's easy to put suitable loops in the wire to take up the bogie rotation. Maybe the wire will be more co-operative if you don't insult it.
Ah, I was assuming 4mm/foot, I didn't realise that it was N gauge. The next level down is litz wire, the type that is used on gramaphone pick-up arms, but that is many strands of very fine bare copper wire, each enamel coated for insulation and then loosely twisted together without an overall cover. It is difficult to solder, (the enamel must be removed with a fine abrasive such as flour paper) and in your case with a metal bogie frame or it's mounting might eventually remove the coating by abrasion, oh and it is quite expensive - as you might expect with high end audio, (suffers from the "if it isn't expensive, it can't be any good")!
Interesting re Litz wire - used this for medium radio-frequency inductors when working at Plessy's nearly 60 years ago. We used the flour paper to remove the woven cotton covering. Soldering was easy - the wires' enamel covering was designed as a self-fluxing compound and you simply dipped the end of the bunch of wires in a molten solder pot and they were joined together!
Two points :Edit:
Also available much cheaper at RS Components:
https://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/hook-up-wire/2094849?cm_mmc=UK-PLA-DS3A-_-google-_-CSS_UK_EN_Cables_&_Wires_Whoop-_-Hook+Up+Wire_Whoop-_-2094849&matchtype=&aud-827175561307la-338446736867&cq_src=google_ads&cq_cmp=9771206761&cq_term=&cq_plac=&cq_net=g&cq_plt=gp&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIlevG2Oba-gIVh-vtCh1Nywx7EAQYAiABEgLfffD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
The Farnell and RS options are (as described above) single strand 1/30 AWG. The ebay options states multi-strand 7/38 AWG. That may suit you better, more flexible.
I'm not sure it is multi strand E, teh advert it seems contradictory. The picture is of multi strand but the description says "No. of Cores: 1".
I doubt that any single core wire that has a low enough resistance to carry the current to drive even an N gauge train will have sufficient flexibility to suit your application. Just what is the clearance between the underside of the body and the bolsters on the bogie?
'Cores' is the number of seperate conductors. For example, standard mains cable is three core, live neutral and earth (other combinations do exist).
That explains it ? ! ?
Not much, and I'd like to put a loop in it. Plus there's the body shell getting in the way too !
Well it came this morning.
How came the motor can drive off a poorly contacting copper "wiper" (from the bogie onto the chassis) with a contact area of a fraction of a square mm ?
Not sure about your measurements. If that picture is of an N gauge bogie where the back to back measurement would be at least 7.5mm, so that would make the gap between the parallel lines more like 1mm. The width of the strips would be about 2mm and their thickness probably around 0.15mm, making it's cross sectional area (CSA), about 0.3mm^2 and it's linear resistance about 0.0345mm/metre. So with a contact area of around the same as it's CSA, the resistance would be negligible, meaning that there would be negligible voltage drop for a current of 400mA. (All that assumes clean contact surfaces, - probably the biggest issue with model railway power connections. That would dictate as heavy a downforce on power collecting wheels that you can sustain.That explains it ? ! ?
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Not much, and I'd like to put a loop in it. Plus there's the body shell getting in the way too !
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Well it came this morning.
Bad news I am afraid, I did not read teh E Bay listing carefully enough, this bit :
Cable Diameter: 1.117mm
I already have cable that size. Buying it was complete waste of money.
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How came the motor can drive off a poorly contacting copper "wiper" (from the bogie onto the chassis) with a contact area of a fraction of a square mm ?
But that's if the wiper is perfectly parallel to the chassis and I doubt very much it would be.
Correcting my last post, - to make sense it should have read: "and it's linear resistance about 0.0345ohm/metre" so it's resistance would be very small and unlikely in itself* to limit the available current even if only 1% of it's facing surface was actually in contact.
