I am rewinding a solenoid for the fuel control on a truck injector system. A slug that is restrained by a small spring is pulled into the solenoid to allow fuel to flow. Since I have a fixed amount of space, I am wondering if it is better to have many windings of a smaller gauge wire or fewer windings of a larger gauge wire. I am not worried about inductance or ease of winding. I am seeking the optimum tradeoff between heat dissipated by the coil and maximum magnetic field inside the solenoid. I am guessing that the amount of heat dissipated is inversely related to the square of the diameter of the wire ( holding everything else constant ). The B-field seems as though it would also be related to the inverse of the square of the wire diameter. ( divide the diameter by two and get 4 times as many windings. ) If I keep everything constant except I vary the current through the solenoid, the B-field seems to vary linearly with the current while the heat dissipated by the solenoid seems to vary the square of the current. Would this suggest that lowering the current and increasing the number of windings would improve the solenoid capabilities. I feel I have made a mistake here somewhere since a gazillion windings and nearly zero current would give me the magnetic field I want. Of course there must be some amount of energy required to move the slug into the solenoid. -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist