The trade's name for very fine-stranded copper wire, strands as thin as a human hair — welding lead, DLO and battery cable. It never grades bare bright, even stripped clean.

COPPER REFERENCE

The Copper Wire Dictionary.

Every type of copper wire, every grade, every trade term — explained in plain English, no jargon left standing. Bare bright, #1, #2, insulated, hair wire, MCM feeders, Romex, THHN, and the rest. Bookmark this page. When you want to understand copper wire, start here.

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PLATE No. 428 — ONE COPPER, THREE FORMS: WHAT STRANDING CHANGES

A TO Z

The copper wire dictionary

Every entry in one line of plain English. Tap any term for the full page — what it is, what it looks like, where it's found, and what to know before you sell it.

Related: sell copper wire reels.

A

Armored cable (AC / BX / MC): Metal-jacketed cable — flexible aluminum or steel armor around insulated conductors. The armor comes off before the copper gets graded. Common in commercial demo.
Aluminum wiring (the lookalike): Not copper — but it fools sellers. How to tell aluminum branch wiring from copper, and why it matters.

B

Bare bright copper: The top scrap grade: bare, uncoated, unalloyed copper wire — bright, shiny, nothing on it. Usually 12 gauge and heavier.
Bare copper wire: Any uninsulated copper wire. The grade depends on coating, tarnish, strand size, and condition — bright can drop to #1 or #2.
Battery cable: Fine-stranded, flexible copper cable for batteries and starters. Usually sold as insulated copper on recovery.
Building wire: The wire inside walls and conduit: THHN, Romex (NM-B), UF, and service-entrance cable.
Busbar: Flat copper bars from panels, switchgear, and MCCs. Solid, heavy, clean — top-grade material.
Burnt wire: Wire recovered by burning off the insulation. Brittle, oxidized, and downgraded — usually #2 at best.
BX cable: Old trade name for armored cable (AC). Still pulled out of vintage buildings and factories.

C

Cat5e / Cat6 cable: Network/data cable — thin insulated copper conductors. Sold on copper recovery; the thinner the wire, the less copper inside.
Coaxial cable (RG-6 / RG-59): TV and antenna cable. Often copper-clad, not solid copper — snip the end and check the cross-section.
CCA — copper-clad aluminum: Aluminum core with a thin copper skin. Looks copper on the outside, weighs like aluminum — and grades like aluminum.
Copper (the metal): The red metal itself: properties, history, and why the world can't get enough of it.
Copper scrap grades: The full ladder — bare bright, #1, #2, insulated grades — and the industry specs behind them.

D

Data center cable: The copper inside data centers: feeders, busbar, grounding, and miles of pulled cable from builds and decommissioning.
Demolition wire: Everything pulled out of a tear-down: feeders, conduit wire, panel guts, busbar. The demo recovery playbook.
DLO cable: Diesel-locomotive cable — extremely fine strands (hair-wire territory), built to flex. Grades as insulated or #1/#2 stripped.

E

Enameled / magnet wire: Copper wire with a thin enamel coating, wound in motors and transformers. The coating knocks it out of the bright grades.
Extension cords (SOOW / portable cord): Flexible rubber-jacketed cord. Fine strands, heavy jacket — sold on recovery.

F

Feeder cable (MCM / kcmil): The big wire: 250 to 1000 kcmil feeders from demo jobs, data centers, and switchgear. Heavy copper, high recovery.

G

Ground wire: Usually bare solid copper. Grades exactly like bare wire — bright and clean is top grade, corroded drops down.

H

Hair wire: The trade's name for very fine-stranded copper wire — strands as thin as a human hair. Welding lead, DLO, battery cable. Never grades bare bright, even stripped clean.

I

Insulated copper wire grades: #1 insulated vs #2 insulated — sold on recovery percentage, the share of the wire's weight that's actually copper.
Identification — "what type do I have?": The field guide: match what you're holding to the right grade and page.

K

kcmil: Thousand circular mils — the modern name for MCM. Same thing, same sizes.

M

MC cable: Metal-clad cable — the modern armored cable. Commercial demo staple; armor off, copper graded.
MCM: Thousand circular mils — how big feeder wire is sized. 500 MCM is a serious piece of copper.
Magnet wire: See enameled wire — the thin-coated copper wound inside motors and transformers.

N

NM-B / Romex: The flat or round sheathed cable in house walls. Two or three insulated conductors plus a bare ground — sold as insulated copper.

P

Portable cord (SOOW): Heavy rubber-jacketed flexible cord for tools and equipment. Fine strands, sold on recovery.

R

Recovery percentage: The share of an insulated wire's weight that's actually copper. A 70% recovery wire is 70% copper, 30% jacket — buyers pay for the copper, not the plastic.
Romex: Trade name for NM-B sheathed building wire. See NM-B.

S

Service-entrance cable: The big cable from the meter to the panel — often large stranded copper or aluminum. Check the cross-section.
Sorting copper: How to sort a mixed pile by grade before you sell — the single biggest lever on what a load brings.
Stranded vs solid wire: One conductor vs many. Stranding changes flexibility — and sometimes the grade.
Stripping wire: Should you strip it yourself? The honest answer: usually no — sell insulated on recovery and let the buyer handle it.

T

Telephone / alarm wire: Thin low-voltage wire — phone, alarm, thermostat. Light copper content; sold on recovery.
THHN / THWN: The single conductors electricians pull through conduit. Nylon-jacketed copper — the bread and butter of commercial scrap.
Tinned copper wire: Copper with a silvery tin coating — looks silver, still copper underneath. The coating keeps it out of the bright grades.
Tray cable: Multi-conductor cable run in cable tray — factories and plants. Heavy jacket, sold on recovery.

U

UF cable: Underground feeder — the gray outdoor-rated cousin of Romex. Tough jacket, sold as insulated copper.

W

Weight chart — pounds per 1,000 feet: How much bare copper is in a foot of wire, by gauge — the field-math table for estimating loads.
Welding cable: Super-flexible fine-stranded lead for welders. Hair-wire territory — never bare bright, even stripped.
Wire markings: How to read the printing on a wire jacket — gauge, type, and temperature rating, letter by letter.
Where to find copper wire: Demo sites, panel change-outs, data centers, remodels — where the copper actually hides.

X

XHHW: Cross-linked polyethylene insulated wire — the heavy-duty conduit wire. How it differs from THHN.

INTERACTIVE

Spin it: a coil of bare bright copper.

Bare bright is the top copper grade — bare, uncoated, unalloyed wire, bright and shiny. This is what a fresh-stripped coil looks like from every angle.

PLATE No. 449

A coil of bare bright copper wire, fresh off a strip. This is the top copper grade — bare, uncoated, unalloyed. Drag to spin it, pinch or scroll to zoom.

GO DEEPER

The reference shelf

When one dictionary line isn't enough, these are the full guides behind it.

Copper grades, fully explained

Bare bright, #1, #2, and the insulated grades — the complete ladder with the industry specs behind it.

Read the grades guide →

The Wire Guide

Everything about electrical wire itself — sizing, types, code, and how electricians actually use it.

Open the Wire Guide →

Copper Resource Center

Markets, pricing explained, quizzes, and every copper tool on the site in one place.

Visit the resource center →

The Carbide Dictionary

Carbide inserts, end mills, drills, and the scrap grades — every carbide term in one line of plain English.

Open the Carbide Dictionary →

The Brass & Bronze Dictionary

Red brass, yellow brass, silicon bronze, and the rest — every alloy term explained in plain English.

Open the Brass & Bronze Dictionary →

READY TO SELL

Know what you've got? Turn it into cash.

You've done the homework — now get today's number. Call or text a photo of your wire: 312-880-8174. Same-day pickup across Chicago, paid within 24–48 hours. Traveling nationwide for the right load.

Call Sonny — 312-880-8174 Text a Photo

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Copper wire questions, answered.

What's the difference between bare bright, #1, and #2 copper?

Bare bright is the cleanest — bare, uncoated, unalloyed, bright and shiny. #1 is clean copper that isn't quite bright (dull, tarnished, or fine-stranded). #2 is the mixed bag — miscellaneous copper around 94–96% pure with more allowed for coatings and attachments. Full grades guide.

How do I know what kind of copper wire I have?

Look at three things: is it bare or insulated, solid or stranded, and how thick. Then match it here — or text a photo to 312-880-8174 and I'll identify it. Identification guide.

Should I strip my insulated wire before selling?

Usually no. Insulated wire sells on recovery — the copper inside the jacket — and stripping is slow, dangerous work. Send it as-is. The honest stripping guide.

What is hair wire?

The trade's name for very fine-stranded copper wire — strands as thin as a human hair. Welding lead, DLO cable, battery cable. It never grades bare bright, even stripped clean. Hair wire explained.

Who buys copper wire in Chicago?

We do — Ironcrest buys copper wire across Chicago with same-day pickup and paid within 24–48 hours. Sell copper wire in Chicago, or call 312-880-8174.