Aluminum Wiring

Aluminum Wiring was used in the construction of roughly 1.5 million US homes built between 1965 and 1973. According to a report published by the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), homes wired with aluminum wires are 55 times more likely to have one or more connections reach fire hazard conditions than is a home wired with copper. This problem only gets worse with time. The mechanical connections (where the wire is attached to the device, fixture or appliance) tend to progressively deteriorate at a slow rate, and in time can reach very high temperature. Many fires have occurred some involving injury and death.

Titan Electric Company only uses the COPALUM Crimp method to permanently mitigate these hazards. The US Consumer Product Safety Board concluded a permanent repair must permit the repair of every connection to, or splice between, aluminum wire in the home. The repair technique must be practical for use in an occupied and furnished home. The US Consumer Product Safety Commission-sponsored research, laboratory tests and demonstration projects identified only one method of repairing existing aluminum wire circuits which meet these criteria. That repair is known as COPALUM Crimp process.

The crimp connector repair consists of attaching a piece of copper wire to the existing aluminum wire with a mechanical crimp sleeve and powered crimping tool. The metal sleeve is called a COPALUM parallel splice connector. This special connector can be properly installed only with the matching AMP tool. This tool makes a permanent connection that is, in effect, a cold weld. An insulating sleeve is placed around the crimp connector and to complete the repair the connection is heat-shrinked.