In my oven, the side with the controls has the wires. The other side has a hard non insulated wire connecting the elements to each other so no wires to melt the insulation off. Since I got rid of everything but the on off switch on the control side ( the PID is in a separate box) and only insulated one inch thick, the wires are still in open air and can keep cool ( I hope). I will have to test a batch of bullets to see how it goes. Not sure what the longevity of the oven will be now that it is all insulated but time will tell.