Standard wire gauge

British Standard Wire Gauge is a set of wire sizes given by BS 3737:1964 (now
withdrawn), and is generally abbreviated to SWG. It is also known as: Imperial
Wire Gauge or British Standard Gauge. Use of SWG sizes has fallen greatly in
popularity, but is still used as a measure of thickness in guitar strings and some
electrical wire. Cross sectional area in square millimetres is now a more popular size
measurement. The current British Standard for metallic materials such as wire and
sheet is BS 6722:1986, which is a solely metric standard.

SWG was fixed by Order of Council August 23, 1883. It was constructed by
improving the Birmingham Wire Gauge. It was made a legal standard on March 1,
1884 by the British Board of Trade. SWG is not to be confused with American Wire
Gauge which has a similar but not quite interchangeable numbering scheme.
A standard wire gauge.

The basis of the system is the thou (or mil in US English), or 0.001 in. No. 7/0, the
largest size, is 0.50 in. (500 thou or 12.7 mm) in diameter, and the smallest, No. 50,
is 0.001 in. (1 thou or about 25 µm) in diameter. The wire diameter diminishes with increasing gauge size. Between each gauge, the
weight per unit length diminishes by approximately 20%. Because the weight per unit length is related to the area, and therefore the
square of the diameter, the diameter diminishes by approximately 10.6%:

A table of wire gauges and diameters is shown below.[1][2] The relationship of diameter to gauge is piecewise linear, only
approximating a (constant-ratio) exponential curve.
 British Standard Wire Gauge (SWG)
diameters
SWG (in) (mm) Step
7/0 0.500 12.700 0.036"/gauge
6/0 0.464 11.786
0.032"/gauge
5/0 0.432 10.973
4/0 0.400 10.160 0.028"/gauge
3/0 0.372 9.449
2/0 0.348 8.839
0 0.324 8.230 0.024"/gauge
1 0.300 7.620
2 0.276 7.010
3 0.252 6.401
4 0.232 5.893 0.020"/gauge
5 0.212 5.385
6 0.192 4.877
7 0.176 4.470
0.016"/gauge
8 0.160 4.064
9 0.144 3.658
10 0.128 3.251
11 0.116 2.946
0.012"/gauge
12 0.104 2.642
13 0.092 2.337
14 0.080 2.032
15 0.072 1.829
16 0.064 1.626 0.008"/gauge
17 0.056 1.422
18 0.048 1.219
19 0.040 1.016
20 0.036 0.914
0.004"/gauge
21 0.032 0.813
22 0.028 0.711
23 0.024 0.610
24 0.022 0.559 0.002"/gauge
25 0.020 0.5080
26 0.018 0.4572
0.0016"/gauge
27 0.0164 0.4166
28 0.0148 0.3759
0.0012"/gauge
29 0.0136 0.3454
30 0.0124 0.3150 0.0008"/gauge
 31 0.0116 0.2946
32 0.0108 0.2743
33 0.0100 0.2540
34 0.0092 0.2337
35 0.0084 0.2134
36 0.0076 0.1930
37 0.0068 0.1727
38 0.0060 0.1524
39 0.0052 0.1321
40 0.0048 0.1219
41 0.0044 0.1118
42 0.004 0.1016
43 0.0036 0.0914
0.0004"/gauge
44 0.0032 0.0813
45 0.0028 0.0711
46 0.0024 0.0610
47 0.0020 0.0508
48 0.0016 0.0406
49 0.0012 0.0305
0.0002"/gauge
50 0.0010 0.0254

See also
Wire gauge comparison chart
IEC 60228, the metric wire-size standard used in most parts of the world.
Circular mil, Electrical industry standard for wires larger than 4/0.
American Wire Gauge (AWG), used primarily in the US and Canada
Stubs Iron Wire Gauge
Jewelry wire gauge
Body jewelry sizes
Electrical wiring
Number 8 wire, a term used in the New Zealand vernacular

References
1. LewcoS Wire Tables 1962
2. Russ Rowlett (2008), American and British Wire Gauges (http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/scales/wiregauge.html),
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, retrieved 2011-04-06

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This page was last edited on 5 March 2017, at 08:06.

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