Posted May 15, 20178 yr Hello all, Quick question about wire gauges. I did some research and found Recommended Power and Ground Cable Size so think I should be okay, but wanted to check in with this community first. Currently, I have 1/0 power cable running from the battery to the back of my truck. It hooks into a distro block and from that block I have two 4 gauge wire roughly ~2 feet or less connecting to two amps. One of them is 1000rms mono amp, and the other is a 100.2 amp for my front speakers. If I upgrade the 1000rms amp to 1500rms, will the 4 gauge wire be able to handle the extra power since it is only a very short distance? The ground for the 1000rms amp is also ~2 feet of 4 gauge, will I need to upgrade that?
May 15, 20178 yr No, you shouldn't have a problem running 4ga unless your amplifier calls for 1/0. Do you know what the min size input is? If you have the extra cable it wouldn't hurt tho.
May 15, 20178 yr Author 2 hours ago, bigrank916 said: No, you shouldn't have a problem running 4ga unless your amplifier calls for 1/0. Do you know what the min size input is? If you have the extra cable it wouldn't hurt tho. I am getting a sundown 1500D and the amp can take a 1/0 wire. I don't have any extra wires on hand and was hoping to keep the replacement install simple. Depending on how I orientate the new amp, I may be able to reduce the length of 4g wire to less than 1 ft from the distro block. If this is really not a good idea, then I can stop by my local shop and grab some extra wire.
May 15, 20178 yr 4 ga wire should be sufficient for 1500w with that short of a run. (1500*2)/12.8v=~234a 0-4ft 4ga should be sufficient for up to 250a. However, you could always upgrade the distro block to hold 2ga wire if you are really concerned about safety.
May 15, 20178 yr 4ga is more than fine, it has no relation to what Sundown marketing has spec'd for the amplifier wire input size.
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