What is Aerial Bundled Cable? What are the main characteristics of overhead cables?

Aerial Bundled Cable is an overhead cable and is commonly used for overhead distribution in place of traditional overhead distribution systems with bare conductors. (ABC) NFC 33-209 Standard cable is also a low-voltage cable that provides higher levels of safety and reliability, lower power losses, and ultimately system economy by reducing installation, maintenance, and operation costs.

Aerial Bundled Cables do not directly hang ordinary oil-paper insulated cables or cross-linked insulated cables on overhead poles, but are a kind of special cable manufactured by a production process similar to cross-linked cables.


General overhead cables are single-core, and can be divided into hard aluminum wire structure, hard drawn copper wire structure, aluminum alloy wire structure, steel core or aluminum alloy core support structure and self-supporting three-core pattern structure according to their different structures. (The core can be hard aluminum or hard copper wire), etc.

main feature
1. High reliability of power supply
The use of overhead cables can greatly reduce various short-circuit faults (especially the common flashover faults of overhead bare wires). Compared with overhead bare wires, the failure rate is 4-6 times lower.
The domestic overhead cable was put into trial operation in Shanghai in 1988. The test overhead cable runs along the dense boulevard of Huaihai Road. After the typhoon season in Shanghai and the high temperature in summer, it runs well, and its power supply failure rate is much lower than that of the original overhead bare conductor. Overhead cables will not produce water trees during use, and the insulation quality of the cables has not significantly decreased after years of operation.
  2. Good power supply safety
The use of overhead cables greatly reduces personal injury and death accidents due to electric shock [3]. The Shanghai Electric Cable Research Institute has set up a special subject to conduct “Research and Test on Personal Safety of Overhead Cable Insulation”. Tests and calculations show that even if the electrically charged cable insulation surface is touched by hand, the induced current is less than 0.1mA (10kV) and 0.2mA (35kV), which is much lower than the 50-100mA lethal standard stipulated by the national electrical safety regulations. It can be seen that when the overhead cable is energized, when the human body or other animals accidentally touch the surface of the cable insulation, as long as the cable does not penetrate, it will not cause harm to humans and animals.


 3. Convenient erection and maintenance
Overhead cables can be erected on any kind of poles or towers, or along walls. Under special circumstances, they can also run through trees and be directly fixed on tree poles with hardware. It can be erected on a single circuit or multiple circuits on the same pole, without requiring a wide “electrical corridor”. In installation, it can be easily erected on the original overhead line, using the original cross arm and porcelain bottle, or a full set of matching hardware and accessories. According to the actual situation of the site, the manufacturer can make special or self-made special fittings, so the construction is extremely convenient. Overhead cables do not need to conduct special inspections, and they will not cause short circuit trip accidents due to tree flashovers, residents littering, or accidental collisions of crane booms, which greatly reduces line maintenance and repair work.