Wire Types Explained for Mobile, Marine, and Off-Grid Electrical Systems
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ก.ค. 2024
- Choosing the wrong type of wire in a mobile, marine, or off-grid electrical system can have catastrophic results. In this first video our Wire Basics playlist, I'll teach you the differences between various types of wires to ensure your safety and success. Or, save time and hassle by purchasing our pre-made wiring kits at shop.explorist.life 😉
This is episode 3.1 in our Wire Basics Playlist in the EXPLORIST.life Academy.
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00:00 Before We Get Started
00:37 Can Off-Grid Electrical Systems be wired with Home Improvement Store Wire?
04:04 How Do Voltage Ratings Work in Wire?
05:22 Solid vs Stranded Wire
05:56 Pros and Cons of Solid vs Stranded Wire
08:30 Why are Strand Counts of Wire Important?
09:34 Difference Between Copper and Aluminum Wire
10:38 What is tinned wire?
12:09 What are the Different Safety Certifications of Wire?
13:14 Final Thoughts - ยานยนต์และพาหนะ
I love that you delivered the full list of certifications with a straight face along with a compelling logo!
One of my biggest mistakes is I used a 4 gage ground wire in my system that was from a car stereo amp kit. It looked cool and seemed ok until it started melting. Only after the fact did I find it was copper coated aluminum. Scared us a bit and we upgraded to a much larger full copper wire. We have since upgraded all of our wires based on the correct requirements plus a bit extra for potential future upgrades.
I always use exclusively ID.10-T wiring and equipment. 👍
Yeah, it dramatically decreases the chances of an issue with the equipment between the keyboard and the chair.
id.10-T rating…epic 😂
Early on in our van build I sized a run to our DC Dometic fridge using only the the distance to the device. We frequently had issues with the fridge cycling constantly and not cooling properly. I then learned from Nate of EXPLORIST Life that with DC circuits, wire sizes need to be calculated with the distance to the device and back to the energy source. I finally ran a new larger wire with total distance using the calculator on this channel and problem solved.
Lookin' forward to this. I'm to the point now, getting close to build time that I need to wait til I have quality, uninterrupted time to absorb the utterings of Mr Yarbrough and take notes. Almost game time. Thanks for what you and Steph do. You da man, Nate! Dan in the mitten
Thank you for the video. Great information.
The problem with aluminum wire is aluminum oxide is a great insulator. If the terminations are not done properly and an oxidation layer present them it can overheat.
What about CCA or Copper plated Aluminum? You still have to upsize, but even still it is way lighter.
Short answer: there are LOADS of other types of wires, but we covered the most common ones and hopefully you can use the information in this video and the rest of this chapter to do your own due diligence on what you need for your own system. We use pure copper and tinned copper in the kits found at shop.explorist.life
So while at the Lowes in Sherman, TX. I was watch somebody order 2 gauge. There was two types, 1) solid core and 2) copper multi string just like many purchase for running 12v lights in a camper. 1) copper was solid and thick core and very hard to bend. Both had a thick black other protector. I could see it was very hard for the guy to cut it too.
Normally I was told they keep it up high out of reach and the had to get a lift to get it down too. Heavy weight spool and made still out of wood. The associate told me that they sell it maybe twice a month and these guys were pros by the shirts they were wearing too. We like the information that you share as a great teaching to all of us. I'm a retired IT guy and reminds me of the days in school.
Nice! Yeah; I've found that farm & ranch supply stores SOMETIMES carry fine stranded battery cable as it's often the same as welding wire (depending on the brand and rating).
Your video made me consider my situation. My camper van’s previous owner installed an 2000W inverter powered by house batteries. The inverter outputs to an electrical outlet that the shore power cord can plugs into. He added a switch to disable converter from charging batteries, but he ran a 12/2 romex cable from the inverter to the 120v receptacle. Basically it’s a romex extension cable with a plug on one end and a hardwired connection at the outlet. After watching your video, I assume using romex was not a good idea in a mobile installation. What would you recommend I use to replace the romex connection between the inverter and outlet? Thank you for your great videos.
we love you Nate, keep up the good work
My largest wiring mistake, so far, was thinking I had a long enough from my vehicle battery to my DC/DC chargers. You answered it properly, but I did find connectors and I'll heat shrink it. I even measured 3,4, 5 times. Still wasn't enough. D'oh!!!
ope, that's annoying. For stuff like that, I usually measure and then add 20%.
Thanks for so much clear info on wire!
Good summary. Like your section on only using certified wire.
Thanks!
Some thhn-2 and xhhw-2 wires are rated for 105C for different applications such as MTW. Also NEC 90C free air ampacity ratings are very close to ABYC and ISO ratings 105C. The standard NEC chart has baked in de-rating for multiple wires in conduit.
Indeed! We will be diving into ampacity ratings and insulation ratings plus their derating tables for both NEC and ABYC in lesson 3.4 of this academy.
What wire would you recommend using for a boat install, Multiplus II x2 according to Victron, needs to use 4x6 AWG but I can’t find a marine wire 4x6 AWG. Could only find 3x6 AWG. What is your recommendation?
We plan on offering this in 2025-2026 pending our new warehouse, but in the meantime, here's 6/4 tinned wire by-the-foot from a 3rd party dealer: sovrn.co/19tqs7t
Nice
Thanks, this is a pretty basic starting point, IMO something everyone should consider. Have you seen the recent changes to Australian/NZ electrical code to include RV's? I found some of it on target...
I, admittedly, don't keep up with electrical codes for every country in the world. Good to hear Aus/NZ is headed in a good direction, though!
@@EXPLORISTlife thanks... While it may not impact our "laws", it should impact our product selection. I do wonder why they demand Li batteries need to be isolated and externally vented from the living space. I think Canada did/does this.
I was hoping to see some silicone wire and how it compares to them wires. Thanks for the video
Even if we didn't cover a specific wire type, I hope the information shared will give you a good jumping off point to determine if your desired wire type is appropriate for your use case. Take what you've learned and apply it!
Hehehe putting in to small of gauge of wire. Thinking about the MONEY. I ALSO have an issue with what kind of circuit breaker to use. Hehehe once I used an audio amplifier circuit breaker with my solar install. Some one pointed it out. It was not a wise decision. Yes I did fix it.
Back in the day, I was taught that copper stranded wire only to be used. Copper, and copper stranded only !
What’s your thoughts on a welding cable vs battery cable in the same gauge.
I prefer to use welding cables. It’s more flexible then battery cable and is rated for more amperage because the more finer strands you have the more amps the wire can handle for a given size.
I also you a lot of silicone wire for my rc charge cables I make.
Is the welding cable rated for use as battery cable? Some of it is, some of it isn't. If it's combo welding/battery cable used as battery cable, that's fine, and some of which is what we sell in our store. If it's welding cable that isn't rated for battery cable use, it should only be used for welding.
All comes down to it's use case, rating, insulation type/temp, certification, etc.
Dude! What a very straightforward, easily understood lesson on wiring! 👍👍👍👏👏👏👏
What is 10 dwyer?
I learned from a knowledgeable associate at Home Depot that solid wiring of the same AWG has more amp carrying capacity than stranded wire of the same AWG.
I had to step up to 8AWG stranded for my MultiPlus because of this. 10AWG solid would work but have less flexibility as you mentioned in this video.
That’s actually generally not true. We will cover that later in this chapter.
ID10T rating?
Yeah. Go ask at your local auto parts or home improvement store for products with that rating for examples.
@@EXPLORISTlife I'll be right back...
Use stranded wire so you don't get stranded.
🤣
The biggest wiring mistake that anyone else could do is let Randy, The mobile traveler do anything electrical work to your van or RV. He had a fire in his own RV after rearranging wires and then doing the same thing to other peoples RVs and vans. 😢
I would buy from you, if you were in Europe..
We ship internationally. We have all kinds of European customers!
Romex should never be used in a moving vehicle. You should only use marine thick triplex wire or even better mc cable to precent damage.
Did you, like, just comment before watching the video? 🫣🤷🏻😂
I literally talked about all of that.
It may be wise to cover CCA wire (copper clad aluminum) so that people know it is out there and to stay away.
Another thing about strand count, DC voltage travels on the outside of the wire strands, so the more strands the higher the current carrying capacity. This is how welding wire with a high strand count can carry so much more power. I love the ID.10T rating joke, we used that one in the Navy all the time for the new guys.......
You said in the past that you would be catering to the four fifths of the world that uses mm for its wire gauges . Why the charge of heart?
I'm INCLUDING the four fifths of the world that uses mm for it's wire gauges, and am doing the best I can regarding putting both all conversion in the videos and/or in the video description/pinned comment. But the reality of it is: I live in the US; where we don't use MM^2 wire, so that's always going to take precedence. Also, just yesterday, I had somebody comment on this video and said "I'd love to buy from your store, but I live in Europe, so I'm not going to". So yeah; since mm2 doesn't pay the bills, I can't focus on it.
Include it, yes. make it the primary measurement, no.
But if the boat were to sink, would you get electrocuted? 😂
Would you choose to get eaten by your shark or would you choose to get electrocuted😂
Speaker wire is because it's ac.... they are counting top and bottom so in reality they are counting 350.
That, too, is such a hard justification for me to wrap my head around. If we look at 310.16 of the NEC, which also addresses/accounts for AC circuit conductors, with 90 degree wire (THHN or similar), we have to get up to a 1500 MCM wire size before we are allowed to flow 700A. And for context... 1500MCM is about 760mm^2. 4/0 is 107mm^2. So 1500MCM, which is minimum for 700A AC per the NEC is over 7 times larger than 4/0. 🤯
ID10T 😂🤣
Sharks. 🤣
🤣😂
I Took Two Wires that Were *"Fangling " ( sort of Dangling but More fan Shaped ) ...out of the Underside of the Steering wheel Column and Created a 'Shorrtt ' ( there was a
" RrrrrrrTT " Sound ....🤔) and I was Able to make Off with some Rich Dudes~ Bugatti EB 16.4 Veyron ! ⚜️🧞🖖😉🧜
Seriously Now Folks - now that Marine application are on Board I will Be A Constant visitor🖖👍🎖️
I’d-10-T 😂😂😂😂😂
I’m 💀🪦