Copper cladding thickness calculator

Geometry, nothing fitted. For a round conductor with copper volume fraction v, the radial cladding thickness works out to t = (D/2)(1 − √(1 − v)). Run it at 4.00 mm and the 10% floor and you get about 103 μm of copper over the steel. One expression, no lookup table.

Ten percent by volume, per ASTM B452, bonded in a continuous molten-copper bath at 1120 °C. What does the floor mean in actual metal? A 4.00 mm wire at 10% carries a minimum radial cladding of about 103 μm. A 1.00 mm wire, about 26 μm. Fine draws live closer to the edge than the percentage suggests.

IEC 62561-2 governs lightning-protection components. It sets minimum radial copper coatings of 70-250 μm for copper-coated steel earth electrodes, sized by rod diameter, plus salt-mist qualification. Check your computed thickness against those radial figures and an electrode spec becomes a number you can verify, not a guess.

It does not. Tin, silver, nickel or enamel plating sits 1-15 μm on top of the metallurgical copper cladding, and none of it counts toward the volume fraction. The cladding is the fused, load-bearing layer. Plating is a finish.

Because corrosion and handling damage are depth events, not percentage events. The same abrasion eats a fixed number of microns whether the wire measures 3.00 mm or 0.10 mm. On fine draws (0.05-0.30 mm) that small absolute thickness is the entire protection budget, so run the conversion before you finalize a gauge.