Standard breadboards and wire size

[kalel]

Which size of single core wire is recommended for "standard breadboards" (the cheap variety) to use as jumpers?

I'm not worried about conductivity/resistance and such properties, just that the wire fits. If a certain project did require special connections, it might not be suitable for a breadboard.

[ElektroQuark]

AWG22-24.

Cheap boards works well with AWG22, some needs something a little bigger as grip is not so good.
3M ones works very well with AWG22, very tight connections. AWG24 works as well.

[nanofrog]

FWIW, the good ones* are rated for 22AWG max. Like RoGeorge, I tend to use CAT5 scraps (26AWG).

*i.e. 3M, Assembly Specialist (ODM for 3M; COO=USA), Global Specialties (COO=USA last I saw), and Wisher (COO=Taiwan).

In regard to the unbranded/crap stuff available on eBay and similar, it's a gamble IME. Just not worth the hassle given what you can get from Assembly Specialist for those in North America. 

Wisher sells ready-made jumper kits that are reasonably priced last I looked, so that may be of interest (as does 3M at a hefty premium, down to no-name brands from other Asian sources).

[RoGeorge]

I am using the wires from the common UTP CAT5 network cable.
I don't know their AWG, but they were always OK, even with the cheap no-name breadboards.

https://hackaday.io/project/7574-the-devil-is-in-the-details/log/25378-unlimited-free-supply-of-breadboard-jumping-wires

[RoGeorge]

I just remember I have this pic.
See the info on the back of the package. Instructions says #22-30.

[nanofrog]

I am using the wires from the common UTP CAT5 network cable.
I don't know their AWG, ...[snip]...

FWIW, it's typically solid core 26AWG IME.

I usually have some of this on-hand, and use it for this purpose (amongst others, such as trace repair    ).

[kalel]

I opened up an old unused cat 5 network cable and found this inside of a single wire (forgive the quick stripping of the sample, just wanted to see the construction):

[bd139]

You need solid cat5/6 for that. The patch leads have stranded. Solid stuff is used in the walls and permanent installations.

[kalel]

You need solid cat5/6 for that. The patch leads have stranded. Solid stuff is used in the walls and permanent installations.

I wish I knew which cables have the solid stuff inside, just to not end up opening various ones without need.

That said, I can still use the stranded stuff for something.

[Ian.M]

If its sold as a premium pre-assembled  lead, with moulded on boots on the RJ45 connectors, you can bet its stranded.  Also it *SHOULD* have the cable specs and wire gauge printed on the cable jacket - if it says 'PATCHCABLE', its stranded.

Solid core (Infrastructure) UTP Ethernet cable is the usually pale gray stuff that usually comes coiled in boxes that are designed to let it be pulled through a guide from the center of the coil for easy installation.  Its also usually marked with an decrementing length in meters, every meter so the installer knows if the length left in the box is enough for the run.  Short of buying a box or reel, the easiest is to sweet-talk network or telecoms installers into giving you their offcuts - a trade for donuts will almost always succeed. and may even get you a  part used box with >50% remaining.   Used cable can be salvaged from skips if you keep an eye out for office renovations.  As you are stripping it, it doesn't matter if the jacket is pretty daggy.

Offcuts of telecoms riser cable are more valuable for breadboarding as they have far more colour code combinations:

[bd139]

Best bet is buy “telephone wire”. This is normally two twisted solid pairs. Also almost universally solid copper.

[Vtile]

I am using the wires from the common UTP CAT5 network cable.
I don't know their AWG, but they were always OK, even with the cheap no-name breadboards.

https://hackaday.io/project/7574-the-devil-is-in-the-details/log/25378-unlimited-free-supply-of-breadboard-jumping-wires

The most interesting part of that post is not the thin, but the thick copper wire. 

[SeanB]

Don't be sure on the "telephone wire" as it could be copper coated steel, or copper coated aluminium, or even just aluminium wire inside.  The real stuff is plain copper, and older wire is tinned copper wire, and is also a 20 or 22AWG wire in many really old cables.  I have a few meters of recovered 50 pair cable though, so will never run out of jumper wire in any colour, though most of the cores will be either white, red or black, as one half of the telephone wire coding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25-pair_color_code

[Ian.M]

Ah - the solid copper wire spacer to convert side cutters into wire strippers.  The copper can be squished a bit to get the desired jaw separation.

Assuming the cutters are small, sharp, with well aligned blade edges and have a good quality joint with no slop, for occasional stripping of non-critical wires you don't really need it as you can easily get a feel for maintaining a stable jaw separation simply by keeping your little finger inside one handle to provide outwards pressure, and holding the other against your palm with your thumb. 

However if you are making your own jumpers in bulk, or need to be certain the conductor hasn't been notched, a good quality sharp properly adjusted manual wire stripper will save you a lot of grief.

On the CCA/CCS wire issue - Aluminum has a much much lower softening point than copper so will flop if a short length (a couple of inches) is held in a lighter flame, and Steel is easily detected with a small magnet.  Always check for CCS (Steel) wire *before* using your good precision cutters or strippers on it as it will FUBAR the jaws if they aren't carbide.

[Muttley Snickers]

I tend to use bell wire which from memory is about 0.8mm and in the past have used solid core UTP which is around 0.6mm, if you are using UTP then best practice is to strip off slightly more of the insulation or expose more copper than necessary, this is so when the core does finally fracture there will be sufficient copper left in the breadboard to extract with either tweezers or forceps otherwise they can be a pain to remove. 

[nanofrog]

On the CCA/CCS wire issue - ...[snip]... Steel is easily detected with a small magnet.  Always check for CCS (Steel) wire *before* using your good precision cutters or strippers on it as it will FUBAR the jaws if they aren't carbide.

Absolutely. 

Some component leads use tin plated steel and need to be checked prior to cutting as well.

Fortunately, it's possible to get tungsten carbide cutters without spending a fortune (i.e. orthodontic tungsten carbide cutter).

[kalel]

Wisher sells ready-made jumper kits that are reasonably priced last I looked, so that may be of interest (as does 3M at a hefty premium, down to no-name brands from other Asian sources).

The high quality stuff is probably good.

The cheapest "dupont" connector wires sold as breadboard wires are magnetic (unless I mixed something up). That shouldn't make huge difference in some circuits, but it's worth noting. Resistance of one according to the cheap multi-component tester is as much as 0.37 ohms. There could be resistances in the tester being factored in, so I tried a similar size (20-30% longer - but also probably different diameter) copper wire, the same type as pictured in my previous posts, and the measured resistance is 0.08-0.1 ohms. So, even if the measurements are not accurate, they do indicate a relatively high resistance for the cheap dupont wire.

[MarkF]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

[kalel]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

[Ian.M]

Individual Dupont terminated wires are only any use for patching from an Arduino or other devkit to a breadboard. Because they are preterminated stranded wires, you cant cut them to length so, if you use them for local wiring, you always end up with a messy layout with excess stray inductance capacitance and resistance.  Also, many of the cheaper kits are colour coded by length which is  <expletive>ing useless if you are trying to assign colours by rail voltage or type of signal to make your project easier to debug.  OTOH good quality ribbon cable (preferably rainbow) terminated with individual Dupont pins can be very useful for keeping longer board to board interconnects organised.

For %DEITY%'s sake, get insulated solid core tinned copper wire of an appropriate gauge in a selection of colours and use that, cut to length and bent to fit close to the board where its practical to do so.  When you tear down a breadboard, save the jumpers, trimming off and re-stripping any kinked or weakened ends.

[MyHeadHz]

I've used 26 AWG wire for breadboards, but I recommend 24 or 22.

[Vtile]

My go-to everything wire.

[dentaku]

This is what most people use in breadboards. 24AWG works fine too but it seems that 22AWG is the biggest you can get away with plus you know it's probably going to fit tightly but not too tight.
Tinned solid copper wire like this is my favorite. Bare solid copper will loose it's shine after while once the insulation is stripped.

https://www.adafruit.com/product/1311

[MarkF]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

I have some with different wire gauge (bought at different times). They very from 0.1 to 0.9 ohms for 6" jumpers. The last ones I bought are the heaver gauge wire but higher resistance. They don't seem to be crimped as well.

[kalel]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

I have some with different wire gauge (bought at different times). They very from 0.1 to 0.9 ohms for 6" jumpers. The last ones I bought are the heaver gauge wire but higher resistance. They don't seem to be crimped as well.

Thanks. Variance is expected, although that's a bit of variance, possibly different materials?

[MarkF]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

I have some with different wire gauge (bought at different times). They very from 0.1 to 0.9 ohms for 6" jumpers. The last ones I bought are the heaver gauge wire but higher resistance. They don't seem to be crimped as well.

Thanks. Variance is expected, although that's a bit of variance, possibly different materials?

No. It's the crimp. It changes with a tug on the wire. Some are much higher. 10s of ohms.

[Awesome14]

I like flexible jumpers with stiff terminals. I get them off eBay. They fail after a while. If something goes wrong, I know it's probably a jumper. Solid jumpers break inside the insulation.

[nanofrog]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

I have some with different wire gauge (bought at different times). They very from 0.1 to 0.9 ohms for 6" jumpers. The last ones I bought are the heaver gauge wire but higher resistance. They don't seem to be crimped as well.

Thanks. Variance is expected, although that's a bit of variance, possibly different materials?

No. It's the crimp. It changes with a tug on the wire. Some are much higher. 10s of ohms.

Not as cheap, but you could DIY your own with better quality materials and tools. FWIW, there's even small gauge silicone insulated wire available on eBay and similar sites if you prefer (down to 30AWG on eBay).

Oh, and an Engineer PA-09 crimp tool will make nice crimps without having to spend a small fortune if you need something that'll do small open barrel terminals.

[Ian.M]

I like flexible jumpers with stiff terminals. I get them off eBay. They fail after a while. If something goes wrong, I know it's probably a jumper. Solid jumpers break inside the insulation.

When a solid jumper fails, if you are using wire with similar insulation thickness to Ethernet or phone twisted pair, it will develop a floppy spot at the break or the stripped end falls off.  As long as you check the wire is still its normal stiffness and its ends are still firm so you don't break them off in the breadboard, there's far far less chance of a solid jumper giving you bad connection trouble compared to a stranded one with crimped Dupont pins.

The only stuff that *NEEDS* stranded wire jumpers is off-board connections like programming cables that are going to be moved frequently.   Even without a crimp tool, you can make up you own with whatever connector is needed for the programmer end and individual pins removed from a header at the breadboard end. Tin the wire end and lap solder it on the side of the pin then sleeve with small bore heatshrink covering half the pin and going 1/2" up the wire to provide strain relief + something to grip the pin by.  Obviously, if you've got the crimp tooling for Dupont pins, they are quicker and easier.

[kalel]

I would like to use solid wire as possibly one of the cheaper but also easier solution than DIY.
I am looking for as affordable as possible rather than quality here. I don't need silicone, for example, unless it's really necessary for some case.

I looked for solid core/single core wire on eBay "China", and what I found was AWG 30. Maybe I'm bad at searching. I'm running into stranded 99% of the time, it's probably the more common type used.

Wire Material: Tinned copper
Core Number: 8
Gauge: 30AWG
Copper Core Dia.: 0.25mm
Cable Max. Outer Dia.: 0.6mm
Nominal Cross Section: 0.05mm²
Cable Length: Approx. 280meters

The title says "8 wires" with 8 colors, so probably not 8 strands.
It's about $4-6 for those 280 meters. It seems affordable, but from what I gather here, awg 30 is likely too small for this purpose.

[MarkF]

I have started using these jumpers from Adafruit. I use the 6" ones which are currently out of stock. They also have 3" and 12" jumpers.

Can you check the resistance, just for a rough comparison?  These cheap dupont wire I measured are "20cm/7.87".

I have some with different wire gauge (bought at different times). They very from 0.1 to 0.9 ohms for 6" jumpers. The last ones I bought are the heaver gauge wire but higher resistance. They don't seem to be crimped as well.

Thanks. Variance is expected, although that's a bit of variance, possibly different materials?

No. It's the crimp. It changes with a tug on the wire. Some are much higher. 10s of ohms.

Not as cheap, but you could DIY your own with better quality materials and tools. FWIW, there's even small gauge silicone insulated wire available on eBay and similar sites if you prefer (down to 30AWG on eBay).

Oh, and an Engineer PA-09 crimp tool will make nice crimps without having to spend a small fortune if you need something that'll do small open barrel terminals.

Thanks. Can anyone identify the exact part number they're using? And already have this crimp tool.

[tggzzz]

Not as cheap, but you could DIY your own with better quality materials and tools.

Of course much cheaper and far more reliable joints can be made very easily: soldered joints in rats nest / dead bug / manhattan techniques. 

Such circuits also have the benefit of a much better electrical environment, so you spend your time debugging your design, not debugging the solderless breadboard. That's why experienced engineers use those techniques!

[nanofrog]

I would like to use solid wire as possibly one of the cheaper but also easier solution than DIY.
I am looking for as affordable as possible rather than quality here. I don't need silicone, for example, unless it's really necessary for some case.

I just like the flexibility vs. PVC for test leads.

I looked for solid core/single core wire on eBay "China", and what I found was AWG 30. Maybe I'm bad at searching. I'm running into stranded 99% of the time, it's probably the more common type used.
The title says "8 wires" with 8 colors, so probably not 8 strands.
It's about $4-6 for those 280 meters. It seems affordable, but from what I gather here, awg 30 is likely too small for this purpose.

30AWG is too small IME for a solderless breadboard. That said, it is really useful for soldered prototyping to make your connections.

Type in the AWG you're looking for, and add either "wire wrapping wire" or "Kynar" (the type of insulation used; similar to Teflon/PTFE, but a LOT easier to strip).

Some examples:

• 20AWG Kynar
• 22AWG Kynar
• 24AWG Kynar
• 26AWG Kynar
• 28AWG Kynar*

* Recommended for prototyping/bodge wire, not in a solderless breadboard IMHO.

Thanks. Can anyone identify the exact part number they're using? And already have this crimp tool.

Off-hand, I don't have a specific P/N for what they're using in China to make the stranded jumpers.

That said, check out JST.  Molex would be another.

Regarding your crimp tool, they seem to be all over the place in terms of whether or not they even work. Hope yours does. 

Of course much cheaper and far more reliable joints can be made very easily: soldered joints in rats nest / dead bug / manhattan techniques. 

Such circuits also have the benefit of a much better electrical environment, so you spend your time debugging your design, not debugging the solderless breadboard. That's why experienced engineers use those techniques!

Of course, and this is what I prefer to do.  Regarding IC's, I tend to opt for an inexpensive adapter board found on eBay and such, and attach it to a double sided 0.110/2.54mm pitch PTH protoboard (also cheap on eBay,...).

But given the nature of the thread, I limited my answers as others may not be using any/many SMD components (IC's or otherwise).