I'm trying to understand the effect of cutting strands in a multi-stranded wire. For example, take a 10/2 wire with 50 strands of copper wire twisted together inside an insulated sleeve, then cut half the strands (at a point along a wire run). My understanding is that the wire resistance is then equivalent to a wire with only 25 strands.
If the cut is only a fraction of an inch long, then why doesn't the current jump across to the other strands, effectively bypassing the cut with a miniscule increase in resistance instead of doubling the resistance along the whole run?
If the cut is only a fraction of an inch long, then why doesn't the current jump across to the other strands, effectively bypassing the cut with a miniscule increase in resistance instead of doubling the resistance along the whole run?