Thread: FAQ: Connecting your Car PC's Power and Speakers

Originally Posted by Lum

And now my own question. What is the maximum current the stock wiring can provide. I don't expect my M1-ATX supply to draw more than 5 amps and most car head units have a 10amp fuse, so surely I can run this off the stock wiring?

The point of this thread is NOT to ask questions! Run wires to your battery.

Heres a few different wire size guides..

http://www.skingco.com/portable_powe...size_chart.htm


This is one from the 12volt source.. it is WAY OFF, but take it with some salt:
http://www.the12volt.com/info/recwirsz.asp
(says 100 watts rms is 16 amps!... 16a x 12v = 192watt, so that means your device is 50% effecient?!? )


ALWAYS use larger wire than needed. This will minimize wire temperature (help reduce risk of fire), minimize the voltage lost (if maxing out 8 gauge you may have 12.3v at the end of the wire with the engine running, and by only replacing it with 4 gauge can go up to 13+v).. (more volts = more power from your amps!)

this might be handy. If you want to cheaply wire four speakers up to a two channel amp then simpy run four wires (two sets of twin) from your amp to the front and then have a Left +/- and a Right +/- then wire the two left hand speakers to one set and the two right hand speakers to the other thus:



sorry if it's obvious but it saved on running lots of cables.

how are you guys connect the 4-12 gauge wires to your power supply?

the wires on my m1-atx are very thin (i'm guessing 16+ gauge) , are you just connecting the larger guage wire to the 16+ gauge wire?

thanks.

Originally Posted by Dragonknell911

I can tell you that no one does that. In order to realize any effects of using larger wire, you have to use larger wire all around.

Most likely the 16 gauge wire is unsoldered by reheating, and then the new larger wire is soldered into its place.

At least thats what i plan on doing

I think this is a misunderstanding. I'm not going to get into a long technical response, but for short distances, gauge isn't a big issue. If the device harness supplies a 1 ft 16gauge wire, you won't see any benefit to cutting the harness shorter as the device doesn't require it. Now if you were running a 1500w amp, 16 gauge wouldn't cut it for any length of course.

The point being, 4 gauge for 20ft split to 8 gauge for 1 ft is no different than running 4 gauge to each device unless the device requires more than 4 gauge to begin with.