fan wire question

[jinsean]

I was planning to sleeve the fan wires for my rad, but I'll probably need to cut certain wires to make them longer. I do have heat shrink to use over the joints, but I was wondering if using say, masking tape or even painters tape is fine?

Somewhat off topic, but would painters tape and/or masking tape be fine for a joint connecting two 18awg speaker wires? My satellite speakers are rated at 65w (the logitech z5500)...

Thanks.

[Jedda]

Anything is better than non but masking tape has minimal insulating properties.
Electrical insulation is what you want.
It wasn't that far OT, I use speaker lead for unobtrusive fan wiring at times. It works quite well for twin wire fan runs.

[virtualrain]

AFAIK electrical tape does just as good a job at insulating conductors as heat-shrink... it's just not that pretty. If the taped joints are going to be covered in sleeving... who will know except you?