Choosing the right cables for an electrical installation that can be covered using a cable ramp, whether indoor or outdoor, is very important to ensure the proper functioning of electrical equipment and appliances, but above all, to guarantee the safety of the installations in your home. We explain what types of cables there are, their differences and what you should take into account when choosing them.

Types Of Electrical Cables: What Cables Make Up An Electrical Installation?

Our electrical system allows electricity to travel through three active conductors or phases: the black, gray, and brown cables, and a neutral conductor, the blue cable. To distinguish between them, a color code is used by the plastic coating of a different color. This helps in installation, provides the system with greater security, and allows them to be easily recognized when making connections.

Phase. It is brown, black or gray. It is the cable that conducts electricity from the utility box to the electrical appliance.

Neutral. Blue in color, it is the one in charge of returning the electrical current to the system.

Earth wire (TT). They are green and yellow. Obligatory in all installations, they derive the electricity to the ground spike of the house. In this way, they protect people from receiving an electric shock and possible damage to equipment in the event of breakdown or failure.

Depending on whether the installation is single-phase or three-phase, different cables can be used. Thus, in single-phase, the cables that can be used are:

Blue (neutral) and brown (conductor) are bipolar (two conductors) (one phase).

Blue (neutral), brown (one phase), and yellow-green (three conductors), three-pole (three conductors), three-pole (three conductors), three-pole (three conductors), three-pole (three conductors (earth wire).

On the other hand, there are various possibilities for powering a three-phase installation:

Gray, brown, and black three-pole (three conductors) (all three phases).

Gray, brown, and black (all three phases) and blue (neutral) or yellow-green (yellow-green) tetrapolar (four conductors) (ground).

Gray, brown, and black (all three phases), yellow-green (ground), and blue penta polar (five conductors) (neutral).