Español| Home | Our Story | Distributors | News | Contact Us |

| Catalog | Manual | Features | Designation | Warranty | Calculator

Manual Menu

Compression Gap

When an Electromechanical cable is designed, the size of the armor wires, their lay length and the lay angle are all calculated to provide maximum strength and wear characteristics coupled with minimum torque.

The armor coverage is also a product of the above calculations, and is designed to be as high as possible, and generally, depending on the type of cable, to be of the order of 97% - 99%. If the coverage were up to 100%, the cable would be so stiff that it would not bend (around a sheave wheel for example) without damage to itself, so the armor must have some gap in order for the cable to be flexible.

In a perfect cable, the compression gap will be equally spaced all around the periphery of the cable, so that between each armor wire and its neighbor there is a equal gap. However, during manufacture, it is difficult, it not impossible, to ensure that the gaps are all equally spaced around the circumference of the cable, and it often happens that most of the gap lies between two particular armor wires. Practically this is of no consequence, and in usage the gap will often even itself up between all the armor wires as the cable beds in.

On a brand new cable, the compression gap is often more obvious than on an older cable, due to the fact that the anticorrosive grease put into the cable during manufacture shows up as distinct dark line between the bright galvanized armor wires.

Previous Page | Print Page