Deuce Battery Cable Guage?

Welding cables are the best, and always a old set laying around that can be used and the lugs are at any hardware and auto parts store.

I've got about 30' of 0 gauge of new welding cable somewhere in my house. That stuff would be perfect. It's orange and has "juddspaintballs" printed on it. I've got about 20' of it in my blazer for my stereo and a big 3 upgrade.

You can go to a welding shop and have them make up a short cable. I would use 00 or 000 cable and eyes on the ends with 3/8ths holes. The welding cable is very fine and carries far more current with less heat buildup than the automotive cable. You can fab up a cable like this if you know how, either way you want a high quality cable nfor any of the major cables on a deuce. You batteries put out over 800 amps on starting and that would melt any cable that was not big enough and also possibly ruin a starter in the process.

RL

rlwm211 said:

You can go to a welding shop and have them make up a short cable. I would use 00 or 000 cable and eyes on the ends with 3/8ths holes. The welding cable is very fine and carries far more current with less heat buildup than the automotive cable. You can fab up a cable like this if you know how, either way you want a high quality cable nfor any of the major cables on a deuce. You batteries put out over 800 amps on starting and that would melt any cable that was not big enough and also possibly ruin a starter in the process.

RL

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The number of strands only makes it easier to bend. The cross sectional area is the same. The I^2*R losses will be the same.

The local electrical shop makes 4/0 cables for large diesel engines that need 1500 amps. Deuces have smaller engines and are 24V. #2 is roughly half the ampacity of 4/0 and big enough. My deuce with all #2 spun over fine and started yesterday with an overnight low of 3F.

Check out www.polarwire.com for some very nice cables. We use the ultraflex at work on our battery banks.

You are totally correct on the ease of bending due to the finer strands. I have also found that Welding cable has a rubber jacket generally as opposed to a plastic, or vinyl type which also contributes to ease of positioning.

I tend to be one to go to overkill on some things, and maybe this is a waste of money, but each of us has the opportunity to make these choices for our selves. I appreciate the input as well so thanks for adding to the discussion.

RL

Mine are 2.0 copper safety cable (Welding Cable). Any welding shop should have an old short piece laying aruond. If you can't find used a welding supply store will have spools of it.

I agree 2/0 for a Deuce. I use welding cable, I solder the ends with easy to get, pre-measured solder plugs and then I heat shrink 'em with those 3 layer tubes with 2 layers of heat shrink and one layer of potting compound. That way I'll never have to mess with them in my lifetime, just a little cleaning of the ends.

As RL mentioned, one of the biggest reasons to use welding cable for automotive applications is the jacket. It is usually made of rubber, almost always a double jacket, and resistant to heat and chemicals. It's also usually flexible in all temperatures. It has larger strands of wire than audio grade power cable. Some people will quote the skin effect on power transmission as a reason to use finer stranded cables, but they usually don't realize that effect happens around 15kHz and power transmission from a battery far lower in frequency than 15kHz.

Use quality welding cable of at least #2 and you should never have a problem, especially for that 10" stretch between batteries.

Skin effect is an electromagnetic phenomena that depends on frequency AND diameter. It has absolutely nothing to do with the number of strands. If I recall correctly, 4/0 is good to 125Hz with full ampacity. Smaller guages can operate at full ampacity and higher frequencies due to smaller diameter. There is a nice table at www.powerstream.com in the technical resources section.

More strands = smaller wire strands for a given size cable. Some people will quote the smaller strands as being more affected by the skin effect, but in reality the skin effect only affects power wire in a vehicle's electrical system if the wire was inches thick. But, this discussion really doesn't matter for deuce battery cables anyways...

#2 or larger will be fine to jump between the two batteries.