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"100% copper" means the conductor is copper across its whole cross-section — not aluminium under a copper skin. The check needs no instrument but a weighing scale.
A 4 mm² copper conductor is 35.6 kg per kilometre. Three of them in one cable is 106.8 kg/km, so a 90 m coil of 4mm² 3 core holds 9.6 kg of copper before a gram of PVC is counted. Insulation and sheath only add to that figure, so a genuine coil weighs more than it, never less. The table below carries the number for every size we draw, and the working is beside it.
A 100% copper wire is one whose conductor is copper across its whole cross-section, so the resistance and the current capacity printed against a size are the ones the standard actually gives for that size. Copper-clad aluminium — CCA — shares the diameter and the colour but not the metal: it is an aluminium conductor under a thin copper coating, so it carries less current and weighs far less for the same nominal mm². The test that needs no instrument is weight, because copper conductor runs about 8.89 kg per kilometre for every mm² of area, and any coil can be weighed against its own arithmetic.
That constant is not a claim, it is read straight off the conductor table: 25 mm² is 222.3 kg/km, and 222.3 ÷ 25 = 8.89. Do the same division on any row below and it lands on 8.87 to 8.89 every time, because the only variable in a copper conductor is how much copper is in it.
Pilone conductors are plain annealed 99.9% pure copper, drawn on our own line in Lahore and stranded to IEC 60228 — class 2 in the standard cable range for fixed wiring, class 5 in the flexible cable range where the cable has to bend. Copper is most of what a cable costs, which is exactly why a substitute conductor is worth someone's while, and exactly why the weight check is worth five minutes of yours.
| Size | Class 2 strands | Copper per km, one core | Copper in a 90 m 3 core coil | Capacity, 2 loaded cores |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.5 mm² | 7/0.53 | 13.3 kg | 3.6 kg | 19.5 A |
| 2.5 mm² | 7/0.67 | 22.2 kg | 6.0 kg | 27 A |
| 4 mm² | 7/0.85 | 35.6 kg | 9.6 kg | 36 A |
| 6 mm² | 7/1.04 | 53.3 kg | 14.4 kg | 46 A |
| 10 mm² | 7/1.35 | 88.9 kg | 24.0 kg | 63 A |
| 16 mm² | 7/1.70 | 142.2 kg | 38.4 kg | 85 A |
| 25 mm² | 7/2.14 | 222.3 kg | 60.0 kg | 112 A |
Read the row for the size you were quoted, not the size you asked for. A 10 mm² core carries two and a half times the metal of a 4 mm² core, and that ratio is most of the difference between their rates per metre — the reasoning is set out on cable price per meter.
Take the biggest common size. A 25 mm² conductor is 222.3 kg/km; a 4 core cable has four of them, so 222.3 × 4 = 889.2 kg/km. Over 90 m that is 889.2 × 0.090 = 80 kg of copper in the coil. Add the four insulation layers, the filler and the outer sheath and the coil on the scale reads higher still. Eighty kilogrammes is the floor, not the target.
Now the step most buyers skip: ask what length the coil is before you compare anything. Coil length is not standardised in Pakistan. Ninety metres is the common length for building wire, but 30 m and 45 m coils are sold as well, and some sellers still quote by the foot or the yard. Weight without a length is not a fact, it is a feeling. Get the length, work out the copper figure for that length, and only then put the scale under it.
The comparison is deliberately one-sided, and that is what makes it usable. PVC can only add weight, so a coil that comes in under the copper figure cannot be holding the conductor its sheath claims. A coil that comes in above it has satisfied the arithmetic, and the surplus is insulation. This is a method, not an accusation against anyone: weigh a Pilone coil by the same sum, on the same scale, and hold us to the same number.
Snip a conductor square and look at the cut face. Solid copper is one colour right across it. CCA shows a pale silver core inside a thin copper ring, and the ring is visible to the naked eye once you know to look for it. A magnet tells you nothing here — neither metal is magnetic.
Get the coil length, take the copper figure for that size and core count from the table above, and put the coil on a scale. Above the figure is normal. Below it is not possible for a copper conductor of that size.
Ask for the size in mm² and the strand code together. If the two do not agree, you have found the disagreement before the cable is in the wall rather than after.
Half the confusion around copper wire in Pakistan is that the shop and the standard speak different languages. Ask for a size in mm² and you get quoted a strand code: 7/.029, 7/.036, 7/.052, 7/.064. In a typed message the punctuation usually falls off, so a 7029 wire and a 7/.029 wire are one and the same request. The code is a count of strands and their diameter in inches, and the area it computes to does not land exactly on the IEC nominal size the wire is sold as — 7/.036 computes to about 4.6 mm² and is sold as 4 mm², 7/.064 computes to about 14.5 mm² and is sold as 16 mm², and 19/.052 — nineteen strands of 0.052 inch, which is 1.321 mm — works out at 19 × π × 0.6605² = 26.0 mm² and is sold as 25 mm². We label by the same market convention everyone else does, and we publish both figures rather than one: the computed area and the nominal size, on 7/.036 single core copper wire, 7/.029 copper wire and 7/.044 single core copper wire.
Say both numbers when you order and the ambiguity disappears. "Four mm, seven by thirty-six" is one wire; "two and a half mm, seven by twenty-nine" is another; and 25 mm² is neither of them, which is the confusion worth being most careful about, because 25 mm² carries 112 A and 2.5 mm² carries 27 A.
The size printed on a sheath is the size of each core, not of the bundle, so core count decides how much copper is in a metre just as much as size does. Single core is drawn through conduit and counted per conductor. Two core carries live and neutral. Three core adds the earth, which is why socket, AC and appliance circuits are run in it; in a WhatsApp order it gets typed 3core wire about as often as three core, and it is the same cable. 4mm 3 core standard cable is the size most houses use for an AC point. Four core carries three phases plus a neutral on a three-phase feeder, which is what 25mm 4 core cable is for. The full ladder, 2 core to 4 core and 4 mm² to 25 mm², sits on 3 and 4 core standard cable; for a single-phase meter tail the usual answer is 16mm 2 core cable.
Copper behaves the same at every size. What changes is how much of it sits in a metre, and that one quantity sets both the current the wire carries and most of what it costs. A 25 mm² conductor holds ten times the metal of a 2.5 mm² one, which is why the two are never interchangeable and never close on rate. This is the ladder in the words the counter uses; capacity is on two loaded conductors, method C, 30°C.
Sizing comes before buying, and in that order. Work the size off the load, the installation method and the run length in the cable size calculator, then ask for the rate. Once the size is settled the rate follows the copper weight in the table further up this page, and it stops being a surprise.
"Al wire" is trade shorthand for aluminium cable, and it is not the same argument as CCA. Aluminium is an honest conductor: sold as aluminium, priced as aluminium, and chosen on purpose. It is lighter and cheaper than copper, and it carries less current at the same cross-section, so a run in aluminium steps up a size or two to compensate. That trade works on service drops, meter connections and long feeders, where the extra diameter costs nothing and the saving is real. It works badly on final circuits and small terminals, where copper's higher capacity per mm² and its behaviour under a screw are what you are paying for.
CCA is the third thing, and the only dishonest one of the three: aluminium sold under a copper skin, at a copper size, against a copper table. The comparison between the two real metals, size for size and amp for amp, is set out in copper vs aluminium cable, and the sizes we draw are on aluminium cable.
The coil is drawn and sold from the same line in Lahore, at the day's copper rate — no dealer margin on top, and the line that made it answers the message.
The business has traded in copper since 1992, well before the cable line itself was set up. Copper is the trade we came from.
Punjab in 1–2 days, the rest of Pakistan in 2–4 days, by courier for single coils and transport for bulk.
Class 5 stranded copper, 0.75–16mm², for cords and tails that bend.
Class 2 stranded copper, 4–25mm², for fixed mains and feeders.
Copper conductor, XLPE insulated, for panel and string runs.
The lower-cost conductor, sold as aluminium and rated as aluminium.
Send the size, core count and the job. We confirm the conductor class and stranding, and quote the factory rate for the day — the 25mm copper wire price and the 1.5mm one both move with copper, so the figure is given on the day you order. Punjab in 1–2 days, the rest of Pakistan in 2–4.