Electrical cables with non-metallic jackets and methods of fabricating the same
AssigneeEncore Wire Corporation
InventorsDavid K. Smith, William T. Bigbee, Jr., Jose D. Garza, Mark D. Bennett
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An electrical cable having a plurality of conductors including a grounding conductor and at least one power-carrying conductor. The plurality of conductors disposed approximately in parallel within an outer jacket such that the electrical cable has a substantially elongated horizontal cross-section.
Claims16
A method of fabricating an electrical cable, the electrical cable including a plurality of insulated conductors and a bare conductor disposed approximately in parallel within an outer jacket such that the electrical cable has an elongated horizontal cross-section, comprising:
- parallelizing the insulated conductors and the bare conductor by feeding the plurality of insulated conductors and the bare conductor through at least one guide plate;
- and
- extruding the outer jacket over the parallelized insulated and bare conductors such that the electrical cable has the elongated horizontal cross-section;
- wherein parallelizing comprises:
- passing the insulated conductors and the bare conductor through a first guide plate;
- surrounding the bare conductor with a paper sheath;
- and
- passing the insulated conductors and the paper-sheathed bare conductor through a second guide plate.
A method of fabricating an NM-type electrical cable:
- passing a plurality of insulated conductors and a bare conductor through a first guide plate to parallelize the plurality of insulated conductors and the bare conductor;
- passing the bare conductor through a paper folder to wrap the bare conductor with paper;
- passing the insulated conductors and the paper-wrapped bare conductor through a second guide plate to parallelize the insulated conductors and the paper-wrapped bare conductor;
- passing the parallelized insulated and paper-wrapped bare conductors through a paper folder to wrap the parallelized insulated and paper-wrapped bare conductors with paper;
- and
- extruding a jacket around the paper-wrapped parallelized insulated and paper-wrapped bare conductors to produce an NM-type cable having a generally elongated horizontal cross-section with the insulated and the paper-wrapped bare conductors disposed generally in parallel within the jacket without cabling or bundling.
A method of fabricating an NM-type electrical cable:
- parallelizing three insulated conductors and a bare conductor;
- wrapping the bare conductor with paper;
- parallelizing the three insulated conductors and the paper-wrapped bare conductor;
- wrapping the parallelized three insulated and paper-wrapped bare conductors with paper to produce a paper-wrapped assembly;
- and
- forming a jacket around the paper-wrapped assembly to produce an NM-type cable with a generally elongated horizontal cross-section with the three insulated conductors and the paper-wrapped bare conductor disposed generally in parallel without bundling or cabling.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.