Hot Under The Collar? Keep Your Cool With 3M

By Chris Dodds on 6th June, 2013

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Hot Under The Collar? Keep Your Cool With 3M

NO naked flames, NO gas torches, NO ignition tooling, NO “hot-work” permit applications required with 3M Cold Shrink.

Cold Shrink Facts - Cold shrink tubing, like heat shrink tubing, is used to achieve a tight fit around cables and connectors as part of cable splices, cable joints, cable abandonment and cable terminations and for bundling cables together for strain relief or protection against the environment. Cold shrink tubing is easier to install than heat shrink tubing, without requiring any special tools or special training. Essentially, a cold shrink tube is an open ended rubber sleeve, made primarily from rubber elastomers with high-performance physical properties, that has been factory expanded, or pre-stretched, and assembled onto a supporting removable plastic core. Cold shrink tubing shrinks upon removal of that supporting core during the installation process. The electrician slides the tube over the cable to be terminated and unwinds the core, causing the tube to collapse down, or contract, in place. Once they are installed, cold shrink tubes create a dynamic, compressive environmental seal and electrical interface without sealants and adhesives. The tubes are always "attempting" to return to original size (smaller than the conductor it is on). The constant inward pressure means the cable can be flexed and the seal will not be broken. Silicone cold shrink assemblies are inherently UV resistant, and with an additive, EPDM becomes UV resistant. Both are water resistant and good performers in a broad range of temperatures. Cold shrink technology is well suited to outdoor applications as well as to medium- and high-voltage cable splices and cable terminations. Generally, cold shrink tubing is more flexible and pliable than heat shrink tubing. Those qualities allow the cold shrink products to move with the cable as it goes through thermal expansions and contractions.

3M Cold Shrink Cable Joints, Cable Terminations & Cable Abandonment Kits




Category:  LV Cable Jointing & Terminating

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