Advice identifying type of wire and sheath inside hair-curling tongs

[seanspotatobusiness]

This photograph shows the inside of a pair of electric hair-curling tongs. Can anyone advise me what is the purpose and material of the white sheath and what kind of wires is it covering? I'm intent on modifying the tongs by reducing the size of the stainless steel tube which covers the wires (9 mm is the smallest commercially available radius but I want to use a 5 mm tube) which will necessitate either removal of just the sheath or completely changing the heating wires.

 

[KrisBlueNZ]

Looks like two layers of woven fibreglass "spaghetti" over standard twisted copper to me, but I'm no expert.

Don't remove either layer, unless you want to void your fire insurance. People do leave these things switched on you know.

 

[seanspotatobusiness]

In any case I've burned out the wire and need to purchase a replacement. The original wire is/was not suitable. I need some help finding the right kind of resistance wire though. The original was 4K ohm over a length of 6 cm so I need a wire with a resistance of at least 67K ohm per meter. None of the resistance wires I can find are anywhere near that. Can anyone advise on what kind of wire/alloy I should be looking for?

According to my calculation, the original was producing about 13 W heat. I'd prefer to reduce this quite a bit since I'm going to be using a much smaller barrel.

 

[KJ6EAD]

The lead wires are copper with a sheath made of silicone and fiberglass. The heater wires are one of several alloys of nickel and chromium and are usually wound on a ceramic form and potted in a ceramic cement.

You can buy cartridge heaters that may suit your purpose. Try the companies "Watlow" and "Omega".