Abstract: A wire strand for reinforcing elastomers such as tires and conveyor belts comprises multiple individual filaments bundled in a core and an outer layer on a common axis. Each individual filament is tangential to all adjacent surrounding filaments and all filaments have identical lay direction and length in a hexagonally close-packed cross section, which is to say that the strand filaments are of bunched configuration. In accordance with the invention, the outer layer includes filaments of differing diameters so disposed with respect to each other and with respect to the filaments of the core that the outer edges of all filaments in the outer layer, viewed cross sectionally, lie substantially on a common radius from the strand axis.